CBS Has Mixed Fortunes in Cable Viewership

One would think that television shows which involved attractive women along with blood and guts would guarantee to have viewers glued to their screens.

This was not the case, however, as CBS's Desperate Housewives and CSI: Crime Scene Investigation programs suffered a decline in viewership as a result of the writers' strike, according to figures from Nielsen Media Research, and stated by the Los Angeles Times.

CBS's overall viewership was already down 13 percent from the previous week, so the news that the CSI season finale went down 12 percent to 18.06 million viewers could not have benefitted the network. This could also be the case for the viewerships of Desperate Housewives and Grey's Anatomy, which fell 11 percent to 16.84 million; and 31 percent to 15.55 million, respectively.

There were some silver linings in CBS's cloudy day, however, as their coverage of Sunday's Academy of Country Music Awards drew 11.73 million viewers, a 26 percent increase from 9.28 million, according to the Los Angeles Times.

CBS ended up having the most hours for prime-time programming for the fourth consecutive week, taking place between May 12 and Sunday, totaling 10.33 million viewers; ABC was second with 9.56 million, while NBC took third with 9.2 million.

While TNT was recognized as the most-watched cable network for the third consecutive week, it was unable to repeat that distinction for week four, only averaging about 3.07 million viewers.