NBC has caught criticism within the television industry for spinning its late-night numbers in a way that treats “The Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien” as the dominant late night program, even though “Nightline” and “Late Show With David Letterman” frequently post better viewership numbers.
CBS fired back with its own aggressive press release Thursday.
Discussing ratings from last week, CBS notes that re-runs of “Late Show with David Letterman” topped first run editions of “The Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien” last week, giving the veteran host his fifth straight consecutive win over Conan.
“LATE SHOW delivered a 2.1/06 in households with an average of 2.95m viewers beating first-run “The Tonight Show” in households (vs. 2.0/05, +5%) and viewers (vs. 2.94m),” read the CBS release.
NBC, nonetheless, would answer that “Conan” continues to outperform “Letterman” in the coveted adults 18-49 demographic. The most lucrative demographic for broadcast television advertisers, “Conan”‘s lead among the crowd is very important for the network.
Previous “Tonight Show” host Jay Leno, however, almost never lost to Letterman in total viewers (nor in 18-49), so regardless of how the networks opt to spin the data, it is clear that Conan has marked a downgrade from his “Tonight Show” predecessor.
