Fox News Ace Cable Numbers

© 2000

Begin Snip

FOX NEWS PULLS AWAY FROM CNN IN THE CABLE NEWS BATTLE: The Florida recounts may not have changed the outcome of the presidential election, but they're changing the outcome of the cable news race.

Fox News Channel is now frequently beating rival CNN in prime-time household ratings and even moved ahead last night in total households despite being available in about 23 million fewer homes than is CNN.

Monday was a banner night for Fox News, which collected its highest household rating ever for a regularly scheduled program when The O'Reilly Factor climbed to a 3.1 rating in homes that receive the channel.

For the night, Fox pounded CNN in ratings averages within each networks' universe of homes, 2.1 to 1.3. Fox News also averaged more total homes, with 1.20 million compared with CNN's 1.06 million. And that's with Fox available to only about 56 million and CNN in about 79 million homes. It's the first time since early November that Fox News has topped CNN in total homes for an evening.

Fox also beat CNN in ratings averages for the Nov. 27-Dec. 3 week, earning a prime-time 1.7 rating, 3 share for the week in households that receive Fox. That's the service's best rating this year, good enough to beat the CNN universe 1.5/2. This caps a gradual turnaround for Fox News since election week, when Fox News trailed CNN by a 0.8-rating-point margin (1.5 vs. 2.3). News Corp.'s news channel then whittled that difference down to 0.3 for each of the past two weeks before vaulting past CNN in Nov. 27-Dec. 3 results.

CNN still held the edge last week in total households -- 1.20 million vs. 980,000 in prime-time last week -- an advantage that reflects CNN's wider distribution.

Counting only homes that get both CNN and Fox News, O'Reilly Factor outscored CNN's Larry King Live in averages covering both the months of October and November. The November totals in the shared CNN-Fox News universe were 1.005 million homes for O'Reilly Factor and 876,000 for Larry King. In the total U.S., the CNN show again has the higher household rating because it's offered in more homes.

End Snip

-- Uncle Bob (unclb0b@aol.com), December 07, 2000