Paris: Boosts Cable News Viewership

Lou Dobbs didn’t need to mention Paris Hilton to spike his ratings: he averaged 906,000 viewers on Friday.

But all the cable news nets received a boost from Hilton’s court appearance and subsequent sentence. FNC averaged 379,000 demo viewers in total day, up from 304,000 a day before (and 231,000 on Wednesday, a relatively Paris-free day).

MSNBC’s total day demo viewership also spiked, from 101,000 on Thursday to 162,000 on Friday. CNN spent less time on Paris than FNC or MSNBC, but their demo audience was still up from 185,000 on Thursday to 220,000 on Friday.


In primetime, Larry King enjoyed 1,417,000 viewers, at least a 50 percent bump. Nancy Grace, over on HLN, experienced King-like viewership at 8pm, averaging 1,068,000. Here’s all the data…