Broadcast Viewership Hits Record Low

By Andrew Gauthier 

Associated Press

Americans avoided television in historic levels over the past week.

CBS, NBC, ABC and Fox together had the smallest number of prime-time viewers last week in two decades of record-keeping, the Nielsen Co. said. Given the dominance of the big broadcasters before then, you’d probably have to go back to the early days of television to find such a collective shrug.

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The first week of July tends to be among the slowest weeks of the year in television, anyway, with families more engaged in barbecues and fireworks. The problem was magnified this year because July Fourth came on Sunday, largely knocking out one of a typical week’s biggest viewing nights. More…

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