Demos Year-to-Year, Thursday 4/28/11

It's sweeps, so this blog's oldest tradition returns! Only one tweak this time around: to save time on data entry, I've programmed this into my big daily ratings spreadsheet. This means that like the daily ratings posts, this will compare timeslots despite my lack of half-hour breakdowns. (In past iterations, I bunched shows together to ensure nothing ever overlapped. So all comparisons were accurate, but many were fairly useless. It's debatable which approach is better, but this one was more easily programmable.) I'll try to remember to put comparisons with overlap in blue as I do on the daily posts.

title	SHOW	day/time	SLOT	previous occupant
20/20	n/a		-13%	Flashforward
Grey's Anatomy	-3%		-3%
Private Practice	-24%		-24%
The Big Bang Theory	-28%	Mon 9:00	-20%	Survivor
Rules of Engagement	-18%	Mon 8:30	-44%	Survivor
CSI	-20%		-20%
The Mentalist	-19%		-19%
Community	-26%		-26%
The Office (R)	n/a		-26%	Parks & Recreation
The Office	+17%	Thu 9:00 (30min)	+33%	The Office/30 Rock
Parks & Recreation	+21%	Thu 8:30	+21%	The Marriage Ref
30 Rock	-30%	Thu 9:30	+0%	The Marriage Ref
American Idol Th	-12%	Wed 9:00	+119%	Bones
Bones	+8%	Thu 8:00	+40%	Fringe
The Vampire Diaries	-25%		-25%
Nikita	n/a		-45%	Supernatural

HOW TO READ THIS: These are adults 18-49 rating comparisons between the date in the post title and the corresponding night in May sweeps of 2010. The "SHOW" column compares each show with how that same show did during the first week of May sweeps 2010, no matter where it aired in 2010. (If it aired somewhere else, I tell you when in the "day/time" column.) The "SLOT" column compares each timeslot's rating with the timeslot's rating on the corresponding night in 2010, no matter what aired there last year. (If it's different, I tell you what it is in "previous occupant.")

Stats in blue are less accurate due to lack of access to half-hour breakdowns. Also on this evening, the supersizing of The Office and Parks & Recreation throws off their timeslot comparisons. Though The Office aired for 52 minutes and Parks for 38, I count Office as an hour and Parks as 30 minutes.

Previous posts on corresponding evening: 2009 | 2010

The full table for Thursday 4/28/11