Online TV Viewing by the Numbers: It's a Different Universe

Hope no one minds that I’m binging on Nielsen data this week, but, as Nielsen has just released its first-ever chart of the top network TV shows that were viewed online, covering December, this data is definitely worth pondering. First, here’’s the chart, via Mediapost. Then we can discuss:

For the most part, it favors “can’t-miss-an-episode” series, like “Lost”, “Grey’s Anatomy” and “Desperate Housewives.” “Saturday Night Live”, the no. 2 program online, stands out as an anomaly, but, given that it’s a younger-skewing show, and that the habit of watching at least some of the show online became ingrained during the blissful period in which Tina Fey impersonated Sarah Palin on SNL, it makes sense that some of that behavior would last.

But looking at this data only in the isolation of the online viewing audience isn’t nearly as interesting as comparing it to the chart below of Nielsen’s top 10 primetime programs on broadcast TV during the same period. It’s quite a contrast, partly because online, viewers can watch what they want whenever they want. “Lost” did not air on broadcast during December, but that, of course, didn’t stop online viewers from watching it on their PCs (despite what the title of this chart says, I’ve only included the top 10 shows)::

Only two series overlap: “Desperate Housewives” and “Survivor.” The juggernaut “CSI” doesn’t even show up on the online viewing chart, even though all three versions of the crime series can be viewed online. and the franchise’s full episodes dominate CBS‘ list of the most viewed videos on its Web site. Nielsen also included viewing of clips from shows in its data so the fact that three series above — “The Metntalist”, “Criminal Minds,” and “Two and a Half Men” — don’t offer full episodes online doesn’t matter for the purposes of this comparison.

Nielsen also doesn’t yet include data from Hulu.com, the video site jointly owned by NBC Universal and News Corp. Would that skew the numbers? Maybe there would be greater representation of shows from NBC and Fox but that data would only heighten the contrast. During the month of December, nine of the top 10 shows on TV aired on CBS. Much more data has to come in before any absolute conclusions can be drawn, but one thing is clear: the online viewer and the offline viewer are two different kinds of couch potato.