The Climate, Weeks 31/32

Continuing the post-upfront preview catchup!

Week-by-week:

Week	Ending	TPUT	y2y	bc	y2y	LeAv	y2y
28	4/7/2013	32.0	+1%	7.4	-2%	2.02	-3%
29	4/14/2013	32.0	-2%	6.9	-8%	1.97	-8%
30	4/21/2013	32.3	-0%	6.6	-6%	1.99	-3%
31	4/28/2013	31.4	-3%	6.5	-11%	1.88	-7%
32	5/5/2013	31.3	-2%	6.8	-11%	1.92	-11%

Season-to-date:

Week	Ending	TPUTy2d	y2dy2y	bcy2d	y2dy2y	LAy2d	y2dy2y
1	9/30/2012	32.4	-6%	9.2	-16%	2.50	-15%
5	10/28/2012	33.3	-3%	8.8	-10%	2.31	-13%
9	11/25/2012	33.5	-3%	8.8	-9%	2.26	-12%
13	12/23/2012	33.4	-2%	8.5	-6%	2.24	-10%
17	1/20/2013	33.4	-3%	8.3	-8%	2.20	-10%
21	2/17/2013	33.6	-3%	8.3	-9%	2.19	-11%
25	3/17/2013	33.4	-3%	8.1	-10%	2.16	-12%
29	4/14/2013	33.3	-3%	7.9	-10%	2.13	-11%
30	4/21/2013	33.2	-2%	7.9	-10%	2.13	-11%
31	4/28/2013	33.2	-2%	7.8	-10%	2.12	-10%
32	5/5/2013	33.1	-2%	7.8	-10%	2.11	-11%

Networks season-to-date (A18-49+):
 

Week	ABC	CBS	NBC	Fox	CW
26	94.02	110	89.61	106	30
30	93.45	110	91.29	106	30
31	93.25	110	91.56	106	30
32	93.09	110	92.07	106	30

The league average is teetering right on the threshold between -10% and -11% for the season. The Voice's softening of late has hurt the recent year-to-year levels. Should be pretty close. There's no American Idol on the last two days of the season, but there was also no The Voice in the last two weeks of May sweeps 2012.

And some network notes: NBC is in a furious race to pass ABC and get out of the original series average cellar for the first time in eight seasons. They're gaining several tenths per week at this point, and thanks to all their expanded The Voice episodes (including five hours in week 33), I think they are probably favored to make it happen now. But it probably won't come until the last full week (34) or maybe even the last three days (35). Less dramatic is the race to knock Fox out of the top spot for the first time in eight years. That's gonna happen.

---

Click to expand for more on the "climate" numbers used herein.

TPUT - This is an ESTIMATED average of how many people are watching TV from 8:00 to 11:00.

• I derive these numbers by adding up all the ratings and dividing by all the shares in each of the 42 half-hours each week. That means there is some error relative to the numbers Nielsen actually releases. Sadly we don't regularly have access to those. I always advise not to rely heavily on these numbers for any one show in any one week, but the hope is that the error is minimized across a 42-timeslot sample every week.

• I include the Old Methodology adjustment, which makes the number more like a measurement of how many people watch primetime programming Live + SD, rather than a measurement of how many people watch any TV (including old DVR stuff) from 8:00 to 11:00. This makes the number perhaps less intuitive in a vacuum, but it's pretty much a wash when making week-to-week and year-to-year comparisons, which is what we're really interested in.

bc - This is an average of how many people are watching national broadcast TV from 8:00 to 11:00.

• This does NOT include the 10:00 adjustment used in the True2 calculation which attempts to account for Fox/CW programming and stronger cable. Again, that perhaps hurts the number in a vacuum, because the 10:00 numbers being used only include three networks, so I'm averaging timeslots that are somewhat apples-to-oranges. But again, it's a wash when making comparisons because I treat it that way all the time. It would not really change week-to-week or year-to-year comparisons, and that's what I mostly care about.

• Another important note here is that these numbers include the preliminary averages for "sustaining" programming like presidential debates and commercial-free benefit concerts whose numbers are typically omitted from traditional Nielsen averages. I might eventually omit these from this particular calculation, but they're needed on my spreadsheets to 1) make PUT calculations in those timeslots and 2) create a competition number for the entertainment shows that air against them.

LeAv - This is a measurement of how many people watch the average moment of original entertainment series programming on the big four networks. Meaning, no sports, no reruns, no specials, no movies, no sustaining programming included.

Note: Beginning with week 9, all numbers compare against the next numbered week in the 2011-12 season. So week 9 compares against week 10 of 2011-12, etc. This was done to make the comparisons more calendar-friendly. See here for more on that.