The Average Age of a TV Viewer Hits 50
June 30th, 2008, 3 Comments »
Via Reddit, I read this Variety article (written in a peculiar style) discussing a study released by Magna Global. It reveals that, for the first time, the average age of a TV viewer has reached fifty:
Fueling the graying of the networks: the rapid aging of ABC, NBC and Fox. The three nets continue to grow older, while CBS — the oldest-skewing network — has remained fairly steady…
For the just-completed 2007-08 TV season, CBS was oldest in live viewing with a median age of 54. ABC clocked in at 50, followed by NBC (49), Fox (44), CW (34) and Univision (34). When live-plus-7 DVR viewing is factored in, the nets (except CW and Univision) drop by a year — which still reps the oldest median age ever for the nets.
Don’t confuse Fox with the Fox News Channel like I did. At 65 years old, the latter’s daytime and primetime programming has the oldest average viewer among the cable networks. I’d expect that for the Hallmark Network, but that seems pretty old for Fox News (and I have no way of appraising the legitimacy of the study).
The writing seems to be on the wall for live television. As producers and advertisers react to this, expect some creative and hyper-irritating new advertising strategies.