February 12-16, 2007

[KLN]

Oh, Steve and his freakouts are getting to be overkill. I forgot to add that. We get it... something's wrong with him. Now go someplace with it.

[Ilovemydays]

THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 15, 2007

1.(1) Y&R: Thursday: 4.6/6,108,000 (-239,000)

2.(3) B&B: Thursday: 3.3/4,342,000 (-166,000)

3.(2) GH: Thursday: 3.1/4,053,000 (-572,000)

4.(7) DAYS: Thursday: 2.4/3,292,000 (-64,000)

5.(4) AMC: Thursday: 2.6/3,200,000 (-789,000)

6.(5) ATWT: Thursday: 2.4/3,108,000 (-384,000)

7.(6) OLTL: Thursday: 2.4/3,035,000 (-341,000)

8.(8) GL: Thursday: 2.3/2,903,000 (-383,000)

9.(9) PSNS: Thursday: 1.4/1,839,000 (-457,000)

Why does DAYS have more viewers than AMC but a .2 lower rating?

All other HH numbers are relative to the ratings points save for AMC.

The HH numbers should not reflect numbers of TVs on, those # would be reflected in the SHARES.

[daysfan]

Days does deserve those ratings and it has been kind of blah for me, but I am still sad about it.

As for the S/K excitement and Shelle on the run it is exciting but just not what most Days fans want. Shelle has been frontburner forever now and whether they have excitement or are just sitting around people are gonna hate it because Shelle is still frontburner. The Steve story has been going for a long time now and tends to get boring so I see where it is all coming from.

Some might possibly be complaining on the S/K story as well just becaus EJ has been made the one who brainwashed Steve which if you know history unless the DiMera's held Steve captive for years EJ wasn't even born when Steve was brainwashed. That is a problem I have with the story but at the same time I think if Joe Mascolo was here he would have been more involved in the flashbacks and we possibly could have had a younger EJ and Stefano teaching him. But in these flashbacks EJ looks no younger than he does now. I am enjoying the story but I see why people do not.

The Shelle story even though I am not liking them being on the frontburner so much I am putting up with them a little bit. But, there are so many problems I could see people having with the story. Number one it is on frontburner so much, then number two I suspect there are fans out there who hate BB and MM's Shawn and Belle just because they loved Storms and Cook. Morely BB's Shawn. Number three the Philip and Willow factors. As you can see in this thread and others there are people who dislike JKJ. I am liking Willow but a few weeks ago I loved her now not so much. But a huge amount of people are Willow haters and to add to that I have noticed on other boards that some Jan/Heather Lindell/Heather Olson lovers hate and will hate Willow no matter what just because she has taken the place of Jan. No one likes Willow being pregnant and the on the run story has been going on for a while now.

Another reason is the backburner of vets which is also a major issue here.

[Ridge]

IA with EVERYTHING you said. You have completely echoed my feelings. And DAYS number 7 in the BIG demo that they care about? Wow, Ice Cream must be on LOCK DOWN there. That's a terrible low for a show that thrives on THOSE ratings alone. If these youngsters and "new" generation are supposed to bring in these viewers... WHERE are they???

I feel bad for DAYS, I LOVE it, it is my soap and I continue to try and watch it but it is just becoming hard.

[SteveFrame]

We talked about this last week - neither of the numbers above have anything to do with the Share.

The HH number represents the number of households tuned in to the show at the time. Each point represents 1,102,000 televisions tuned into the show.

The number of viewers is a complete estimate based on information that Nielsen collects about the size of the household. There is no way of knowing exactly how many people are actually watching.

Number of viewers looks good but it is far less accurate than the HH number is which is why advertisers do not much stock in it.

All that this basically means is that ATWT had more households on at the time, but their households did not have as many viewers or were smaller households.

Days had 220,400 less TV's/households viewing their show that day, but they happened to have been households with a larger audience.

The advertiser looks at that but knowing how the Nielsen's work they are going to look more favorably on the more TV's than are the more viewers.

I give you an example - say on that day Household 1 is the dwelling of a single young lady. She has 3 TV's. Nielsen records that she only has 1 TV on that day. They can represent her household as 1 HH point and 1 viewer point with accuracy.

Household #2 has is a household of 6 people who have 4 TV's. They only have 1 TV on at the hour which means Nielsen is going to count all 6 people as watching, but there may have only been 1 actual person at home.

Nielsen definitely knows that the TV was on but they have no way real way of knowing actually who was tuning in. So the viewer numer is far more skewed than the HH number is.

So as I said they look at both ratings, but they look more at the HH rating and then the demos too. They do look at viewers but don't let that influence them as much as the HH rating.

[ademption]

Well, it's sad to see these numbers, but I can't say that I'm all that surprised. I enjoyed some of the scenes from last week--the Nick/Chelsea storyline and even the Mabby scenes on Friday, but for the most part, the show was middling last week. I think Hogie and the Days' producers have forgotten to stay attuned to their main audience, at least where ratings are concerned. Advertisers most favor the women 18-49 and 18-34 numbers the most, correct? That's basically housewives, working women with alternative work schedules who have hours other than from 9-5 and now college-aged women. What is the primary reason that these women watch soaps? I'm thinking of a housewife who has all these household chores and changing the baby's diapers . During her baby's naptime, she has a limited amount of time just to herself to relax. Not to generalize too much, but I would think that this woman turns on her soap to see romance and fulfill her romantic fantasies of the perfect guy treating the lady protagonist (with which she identifies) the way that she would want to be treated or the way that she would want women in general to be treated. She wants to see the candlelight dinners and surprise afternoon picnics among lovers etc.

What would this housewife/woman viewer have seen the past few weeks let alone past month that would encourage her to watch the show if her main reason for watching the show was romance? The Lumi proposal where the woman starts crying every five minutes and then tells her boyfriend that she's not worthy of him? Does Hogie et al really think that is what women want to see for escapist entertainment? Do the producers of the show really expect women to enjoy seeing a character that used to be very independent, go getter practically passive while her rapist gets away with jeering at her 24/7? I'm not a housewife and I don't pretend to speak for every woman, but this woman does not enjoy the Lumi storyline right now, even though Lucas and Sami are (or at least used to be) my favorite characters on this show. I should have been on cloud nine last week with Lumi's proposal. But I wasn't, b/c IMHO, the proposal was ok, but the setting wasn't that romantic. It looked like it was slapped together with no forethought about it at all. If Hogie is going to just have filler episodes anyway, why not include shows with romantic scenes? Here's a thought. Just an idea, but instead of Lucas popping the question out of nowhere, how about Lucas making a nice dinner for Sami at the apartment. We the audience could have seen Lucas making the preparations for the special dinner that he cooked for Sami. He could have put candles and maybe even flower petals all around the apartment and when Sami got home, she could have become generally surprised. They could have talked about their relationship and then Lucas could have proposed to Sami. Or Lucas could have left a series of notes somewhere where Sami would find them and which would have lead her to her engagement ring. I guess what I'm trying to say in a long-winded way was that Hogan could have built these scenes up so that they were more exciting, special and a little light-hearted. The show on Valentine's Day was so heavy b/w Sami crying that she was unworthy and the Nick/Chelsea blowup (although in that episode the Nick/Chelsea scenes were my most favorite scenes).

I'm using Lumi as an example but you could say that about all the supercouples. Bo and Hope were on last week as props for the Nick/Chelsea storyline. The John/Marlena scenes are just weird in their execution. Where's the romance? And when I'm talking about romance, I don't mean Lumi slurping on each other either. I'm talking about walks/picnics in the park, a candlelight dinner, even a dinner at Maggie's restaurant could be fine; dancing; seeing couples making love AND most importantly, the afterglow, where the audience sees the couple cuddling, to show the emotional intimacy between the characters.

Days' special niche is supercouples. Many here decry the concept even I've done so here at times, but Days' market is what is. That's what makes Days special. IMHO, if Days started showing a little more love in the afternoon with their supercouples, rather than this extraneous stuff, their numbers would probably go up. Now, I'm not saying that Days should have love scenes every day of the week. However, if the show's producers are reading this board, I would recommend having one day out of the week devoted to "love in the afternoon." You know how Guiding Light on Wednesdays(?) devotes a show to one character? I would devote the show probably on Wednesdays to seeing Days' supercouples in different romantic settings. One couple would make love and then we would see the afterglow; one couple would have a night/day on the town, dancing and having dinner and another couple might just have a conversation that displayed some type of emotional intimacy or romantic conflict between them. The rest of the week's episodes would revolve around the Wednesday shows. The writers could incorporate the main events for the week to lead up to or result from the Wednesday shows. You know it really wouldn't even have to be every week, maybe every 2 weeks. But I think that the idea would make a lot of the fanbases and women who watch the show just generally for romance in soaps, really excited about the show again.

I don't think that it's enough to see a fave couple like John and Marlena or Bo and Hope on screen, especially if they are only going to be used as props for their children or other characters. Their fans need to get their payoff and see them in romantic scenes together. I also think that Hogie might need to add a few more women writers to the show--or better yet strong, opinionated women writers who will go to bat for writing women the way that women want to be written. Maybe I'm just speaking for myself, but I don't find it entertaining to watch women acting needy and say such absurd things like you can't leave me b/c I would die without you (Kayla to Steve) or whiny/passive women who say that they don't deserve their boyfriend's love and/or ask their boyfriend for permission whether it is alright for them to look through a freaking bridal magazine (Sami). It's just not enjoyable or entertaining at all, especially in this day and age.

Remember those cheesy scenes with John and Marlena being serenaded by Smoky Robinson? The execution of that side storyline was subpar and the idea of Marlena dropping from the sky near Smoky Robinson's winter cabin was ridiculous, but the concept of the candlelights and the supercouple dancing together was right on target. And if I recall correctly, that particular episode got decent ratings, maybe 2.7. It made not only J&M fans happy, but also women who may not have a particular fave couple, but watch soaps for the romantic factor. If Days added that and had better breakdown of the scripts, I really think the ratings would go up.

I like some of the things that Hogie is doing right now, especially the family-centric scenes. There's been some decent character development of the younger characters. I don't want to give the impression that I'm a Hogie hater. I just think that he could make Days better than it is right now....

[Ilovemydays]

According to:

http://www.thefutoncritic.com/ratings.aspx?id=faq

2. So what does a household rating mean?

For the 2006-07 season, Nielsen Media Research has determined there are an estimated 111,348,110 television households in the U.S. This means that a single national household ratings point represents 1%, or 1,113,481 households.

With the above in mind, a 4.4 household rating equals 4.4% of 111,348,110 million television households or 4,899,317 households.

3. So that's great and all. How do I find out exactly how many people (not just households) watched the show?

Unfortunately, we do not have access to the total viewers numbers on a daily basis.

Also keep in mind, the number of actual total viewers CANNOT be determined from the household rating or household share. Obviously since there is at least one person in a household, the total viewers will be "at least" 4,899,317 people in the above case.

***The number of veiwers within the HH are NOT considered into the daily ratings, so your point would be moot.

[Mason]

I love Hogan and his writing of DAYS, but he has just GOT to step it freaking up! February sweeps is NO time for establishing stories. I have just been utterly disappointed with DAYS this month. The show's still good, but this is SWEEPS for God's sake. Hogan, I KNOW you can do better. All I have to say is that May sweeps better be DAMN good after this.

[Soapsuds]

Hogan never wrote for sweeps on ATWT. So I doubt he will start at Days. I also read where someone was thrilled to see Marlena again. Can anyone say Lucinda Walsh? When Hogan took over at ATWT Lucinda vanished! I wouldnt be surprised if he did that with Marlena. He never wrote for the vets on ATWT.

[sema608]

Sadly, I agree Hogan's not on top of the game. His writing at ATWT was much better than this. He's a great writer, but now that time has passed, I don't think Days is for him. Something's off. The writing quality is there, but I'm not invested in the supercouples and I started rooting for the teen couples, until 2 weeks ago. That's when I stopped catching up and not gone back to watch. *sigh*

Whomever said Hogan's worst ATWT stories are better than this, I agree. I'm not interested in seeing Shelle, John/Marlena, Steve/Kayla. I'm sorry, but I want to see something more than couplehood. There's so many things Hogan can do, but whether it's behind the scenes problems or writer's block, Days isn't on "GO". Oh and Hogan doesn't write for sweeps. You'll have to get used to it, unless Corday orders him to write one.

[SteveFrame]

What do you mean? Nielsen figures the daily ratings everyday just like they do for weekly. That is who Lskreet and Toups get them from. Nielsen figures them - not anyone else.

If you are referring to the statement that The Futon Critic makes: "Unfortunately, we do not have access to the total viewers numbers on a daily basis."

They are just referring to the fact that they do not have them - not that Nielsen does do them on a daily basis because Nielsen does. They make the viewer estimate daily just like they do the HH. For primetime they even release overnights with a HH and an estimated number of viewers for the episode. Sometimes for big events like Luke & Laura's wedding they will even give an estimate of how many viewers tuned in that day based on the HH rating.

So yes they are.

There are 3 numbers figured by Nielsen each day and are usually publicized in this manner: HH/Share followed by the Number of Viewers.

[Mason]

True, but what he did at ATWT is irrelevant now that he's at DAYS. DAYS NEEDS good sweeps numbers, and this stuff is NOT gonna bring them in.

[Soapsuds]

It's not irrelevant. It is a pattern with him. Days looks like ATWT did when he stepped down as HW. Where are his major storylines for vets?

[Mason]

With all due respect, DAYS looks NOTHING like ATWT did at the end of Hogan's run. The show was a mess. DAYS is far from that. It may be a little dull right now, but the quality is still there. I really wish people would stop comparing Hogan's ATWT to Hogan's DAYS, they're not the same thing.

[JER Soaps Fan]

PRAISE JESUS!!

I knew the ratings would soon start to catch up with the BEST SOAP OPERA ON THE AIR: "ALL MY CHILDREN!!!" :wub: