Friday, September 5, 2008

37 Million Viewers Was the Record

obama-sweating.jpgFor the all heaps and praise that Barack Obama got for shattering viewership records with his acceptance speech last week at the DNC by attracting over 38 million viewers, one might now say that records are meant to be broken.

Via My Way:

After days of intense media coverage about Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin’s qualifications, more than 40 million Americans tuned in Wednesday to see for themselves what they thought of her.

The huge audience for Palin’s acceptance speech rivaled that for Obama’s address at the Democratic National Convention six days earlier, and set a tough standard for the top of her own ticket. John McCain was to accept the GOP presidential nomination on Thursday.

An audience of 37.2 million people watched Palin on ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, Fox News Channel and MSNBC, Nielsen Media Research said Thursday. PBS estimated its audience at 3.9 million, based on a less reliable sample of several big cities.

And now we come to find out that John McCain’s preliminary viewership comes in higher than Obama’s too:

Presidential candidate John McCain’s acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention drew more television viewers than his rival Barack Obama attracted at the Democratic party’s event last week, according to preliminary ratings from Nielsen Media Research.

Across all broadcast networks Thursday, Sen. McCain’s speech ended the night with a 4.8 rating/7 share, compared to Sen. Obama’s 4.3/7 average, according to overnight numbers from metered households in 55 U.S. markets measured by Nielsen.

And lest we forget, Joe Biden’s speech only got a measly 24 million viewers. Looks like he’s small potatoes in the grand scheme of things.

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