Explaining Yesterday’s “Trend” Post

I received several critical e-mails for yesterday’s post pointing out that April 2006 was Fox News Channel’s worst month in the 25-54 demo since August 2001.

Some e-mailers suggest that I look at the daily and monthly numbers. “Why are you leaving out CNN’s drop in primetime demo in April whcih was double Fox’s (38 to 19)?,” another person asked.

Why? Because I already posted the information about CNN’s demo drop. Yesterday’s post was about five year trends, not about one month’s averages.

“CNN has had a miserable few years as well, and they never overtook Fox, so why is Fox the only cable news channel you single out?,” another person asked. As I explained yesterday, FNC is #1, so it has the most to lose. CNN’s depressing ratings are written about on a regular basis. But the viewership challenges FNC is facing (among demo viewers, on the weekends, etc) are worth writing about, too.