CNN Tops FOX For 'Super Tuesday,' Sort Of
Super Tuesday ratings: "CNN outdelivers FOXNews in total viewers during prime," Matt Drudge breathlessly reports tonight. At 8pm, FOX registered a 1.4, CNN had a 0.8, and MSNBC had 0.5. By 9pm, CNN had a 1.3, FOX was down to 1.0, and MSNBC held steady at 0.5. At 10pm, CNN dipped to 1.0, FOX was at 0.9, and MSNBC fell to 0.3. (The trends were typical -- CNN was up during Larry King, and FOX was highest during O'Reilly's time slot, even though Brit replaced Bill last night.) A TVSpyer was sarcastic: "Yes, CNN has topped Fox News for the first time in approx. 850 days. What does this mean?? The end of Fox as a rating leader?" 10:07:03 PM

Cleaning Crews Pull Plug on Greta's Live Shot -- (During a Commercial)
Greta takes blog readers behind the scenes of her two-hour show yesterday: "Midway through our second hour, and luckily it was during a commercial break, all our power went out. The crew (and my husband who I brought along to watch the show) scrambled to find out what happened. I was told that the building crew cleaning up and closing the building pulled out our power cords. I know it is not funny, but I laughed. Just exactly what were we going to do if we could not solve the problem at the end of the commercial break? It is live TV so I figure the viewers would not find it fatal. My husband was then "assigned" to watch the power cords." She has photos up, too; her media badge was a lot nicer than my media badge from the day before!... 7:41:33 PM

Viewer to FOX: "Please Stop" Constant News Alerts
Several TVSpy posts decry FOX's News Alerts. "It seems that EVERY single story on Fox News Channel during the day hours is a FOX NEWS ALERT. It's becoming dry. Please stop it," one person writes. "Today they had 3 or 4 news alerts on Martha Stewart's case going to the jury in less than 15 minutes," another post adds. "Maybe that's their real secret to their ratings success," someone says, I hope jokingly... 7:37:44 PM

CNBC's Lack of Competition is an "Opportunity," Ailes Says
From the mouth of Roger Ailes: "CNBC has no competition, so whenever you have a situation where you have no competition, and a third of it (programming) is infomercials ... you have an opportunity to do business." It's a quote from Reuters this afternoon. The wire service translated that into "Ailes said...CNBC was fair game for competitors as it looks at the potential for new channels under the Fox name." But commenting on the possibility of future FOX channels, he said that "the speculation is out ahead of the reality." More... 7:01:30 PM

CNN Wins Seven 'Headliners'
CNN won 7 National Headliner Awards yesterday. (MSNBC and FOX didn't win any.)
  > In the Best Newscast category, they placed 3rd for Paula Zahn and Jim Miller's "Fall of Saddam."
  > In the Coverage of a Major News Event category, they placed 1st for "Capture of Saddam Hussein," 2nd for Newsnight's coverage of the Blackout, and 3rd for Miles O'Brien during the Columbia disaster. In the Continuing Coverage of a Major News Event, they placed 3rd for "Crisis in Liberia."
  > In the Coverage of War and War Related Stories category, they placed 1st for "CNN Presents: Fit to Kill."
  > In the Investigative Reporting category, they placed 3rd for "CNN Presents: Easy Prey: Inside the Child Sex Trade."
  > In the Feature, Sports, or Human Interest Story category, they placed 2nd for "CNN Presents: Whatever it Takes, Persuing the Perfect 0."
CNBC placed 1st and 2nd in the Business and Consumer Reporting category. 1st went to Sue Herera and co. for "CNBC in India," and 2nd went to David Fabor and friends for "The Big Lie." (The latter is re-airing tonight.) Here's the full list. 6:31:41 PM

CNN Wins Four Gracie Allen Awards
The Foundation of American Women in Radio and Television awarded CNN four Gracie Allen Awards last week. (CNN sent along a press release today.)
  > Outstanding Talk Show: Larry King Live's Katherine Hepburn tribute
  > Best News Feature: Newsnight's "From the Eyes of Babes"
  > Outstanding Public Affairs Program: On the Story
  > National News Story - Series: Candy Crowley, "War Stories"
Winners will be honored at an event on June 22 in N.Y., the release said... 6:30:27 PM

CNBC Says It Was 1st With Edwards Drop-out
In a press release today, CNBC says that it was the first to report the Edwards drop-out news last night. 5:07:14 PM

"Is CNN doing everything it can to attract new viewers?:" No
A great story on Forbes.com analyzes CNN. It asks: "Is CNN doing everything it can to attract new viewers"? Columnist Sam Whitmore says the answer is no, and compares CNN.com to the FOX Fan Central web site. He offers advice for Jim Walton: "Don't sit on your 'cume.' Jazz up your Web site. Build out the best viewer appreciation department in the business and give it a decent budget. And do it now--while you're still in the cable TV news driver's seat." 5:06:15 PM

CNN en Espanol Radio News
In case you care: "CNN en Español RADIO has signed a representation agreement with Spanish-language news talk radio network and syndicator, Radiovisa Corporation. Radiovisa becomes the advertising sales and distribution representative for CNN en Español RADIO programming within the United States. CNN en Español RADIO will continue producing radio-specific newscasts and other content, as well as retaining all editorial control. Radiovisa will also spearhead U.S. sales and affiliate marketing representation." 4:47:56 PM

The NYT Likes Bob Dole's Punditry
Bob Dole's CNN commentary is described as "laconic, droll and unflinchingly pragmatic," the New York Times says in an article I forgot to link to yesterday. "He handicaps the Democratic presidential contest, dispenses a heavy dose of reality to the candidates and even ministers to the losers, all on live television," the writer writes. Very good article... 4:33:10 PM

MSNBC's "Nifty high-tech map" of Electoral Votes
Mark Jurkowitz was impressed by MSNBC's electoral map. "Tim Russert began talking about the 16 hotly contested battleground states between Bush and Kerry. The cable outlet then trotted out a nifty high-tech map that played out electoral vote scenarios in a campaign between the two men. As he fiddled around with vote totals by -- for example -- moving Florida into the Kerry column and thus delivering the Massachusetts senator a mythical 2004 White House win, MSNBC contributor Ronald Reagan Jr. exclaimed that 'this map rocks.'" 10:37:15 AM

Analyzing February's Cable News Ratings
The Hollywood Reporter sums up February's cable news stats in this story. "Politics, Donald Trump and Dennis Miller helped NBC's two cable news networks improve their share of the primetime news audience last month, but it's far from certain they can maintain the momentum," they write, and break down the stats into readable chunks... 10:30:29 AM

Five Minutes is a Matter of Pride
Interesting comments from David Folkenflik (very nice guy) in the B-Sun: "...First CNN and then MSNBC announced shortly after 8 p.m. -- and well before the polls had closed in California -- that Edwards had decided to pull out of the presidential race. But it took Fox News valuable minutes before it shared that important piece of news with viewers -- clearly the single most important development of the evening, as it removed Kerry's sole credible challenger. The average viewer who stayed with Fox News would have found out soon enough. As a matter of pride, however, that delay must have rankled Fox's political reporters. If it didn't, it should have." 10:28:48 AM

More How-to-Fix-MSNBC Suggestions
A couple more letters at Romenesko talk about how MSNBC could turn around. They offer their recollections of MSNBC's early days, and discuss possible changes. "I suppose if I had the answer to what ails MSNBC, I'd be earning Rick Kaplan-like money," one points out. Some interesting comments over there... 10:26:27 AM

Cable News #'s Down Across the Board Compared to '03
Cynopsis points out that cable news networks lost a whole lot of viewers compared to this time last year (as war drums got louder and louder.) Quoting: "The five cable networks to lose the most ground Feb 03 to Feb 04 in primetime among A18-49 are Headline News -47%, Fox News -38%, CNN -35%, MSNBC -34%...The five cable networks to lose the most ground Feb 03 to Feb 04 for Total Day among A18-49 are CNN -45%, Headline News -39%, MSNBC -37%, Fox News -36%." 10:00:13 AM

Last Week's News Viewer Index
Cynopsis has the news viewer index for Feb. 23 to 29. In total day, "Fox News had 48% of the viewing, CNN 28%, MSNBC 13%; and Headline News 11%." In primetime, "Fox News had 52%, CNN 30%, MSNBC 11% and Headline News 7%." 10:00:06 AM