The vast majority of us who tune in Sunday night's Super Bowl match-up of the New Orleans Saints and the Indianapolis Colts will be doing so at home.
It won't necessarily be our own home, but new numbers from from Nielsen Media Research say that 9 out of 10 Super Bowl watchers won't be watching in a bar or restaurant.
Nielsen also reports that the majority of Super Bowl viewers, some 51 percent, are tuned in for the ads, and not the game.
Not surprisingly, ads that run early in the game -- before the effects of sustained celebration -- are remembered better and liked more than commercials that air later in the game.
Here's a reminder that I'll be live-blogging during the game Sunday evening -- focusing on the commercials -- right here at OnMilwaukee.com.
The January numbers: The January ratings period -- though not usually as important as February -- ended Wednesday night, and the numbers showed Channel 4 barely edging Channel 12 in a 10 p.m. photo finish.
Channel 4 averaged some 70,892 southeast Wisconsin households at 10 p.m., to Channel 12's 69,715. Channel 4 had a 13.3 percent share of homes watching TV and Channel 12 had a 13.2 percent share, according to early Nielsen numbers.
Channel 58 came in third with 48,529 households, a 9.1 share. Channel 6 was fourth with 45,994 households and an 8.7 share.
Not surprisingly, Jay Leno's failed prime-time show finished fourth in the 9 p.m. hour on Channel 4.
The February sweeps period begins tonight, but with NBC spending a couple weeks focusing on the Winter Olympics, it won't be a normal February sweeps this time around.
On the radio: WUWM-FM (89.7) starts an eight-day on-air fund-drive Monday. In addition to calling 414-227-3210, listeners can use a secure on-line form.
- Speaking of WUWM, the first of my regular chats about media with Bonnie North of the daily "Lake Effect" aired this week. You can find the audio here. "Lake Effect" airs at 10 a.m weekdays, with repeats at 11 p.m.
- If you hear a familiar voice in radio spots starting next week for JobNoggin.com, it's none other than Milwaukee radio veteran Danny Clayton.
- Sirius/XM satellite radio is offering special programming in addition to its array of game broadcasts this weekend. Among the events, Jamie Foxx's "Foxxhole" comedy/entertainment channel (Sirius 106/XM 149) goes live at 11 a.m. Friday, and continues through the afternoon. Emeril Lagasse goes live from 1 to 3 p.m. Friday with "Cooking with Emeril" with other big chefs sharing Super Bowl recipes on Sirius 112/XM 157.
Stewart visits O'Reilly: The first part of Jon Stewart's sit-down with Fox News Channel's Bill O'Reilly featured the host of Comedy Central's "Daily Show" calling Fox News Channel a "cyclonic perpetual emotional machine that is 24 hours a day, 7 days a week."
Said Stewart, "They have taken reasonable concerns about this president and this economy and turned it into full-fledged panic attack about the next coming of Chairman Mao."
More of the interview airs tonight at 7, and here's the first part of Wednesday's segment:
Here's part two of Wednesday's segment:
Tim Cuprisin is the media columnist for OnMilwaukee.com. He's been a journalist for 30 years, starting in 1979 as a police reporter at the old City News Bureau of Chicago, a legendary wire service that's the reputed source of the journalistic maxim "if your mother says she loves you, check it out." He spent a couple years in the mean streets of his native Chicago, and then moved on to the Green Bay Press-Gazette and USA Today, before coming to the Milwaukee Journal in 1986.
A general assignment reporter, Cuprisin traveled Eastern Europe on several projects, starting with a look at Poland after five years of martial law, and a tour of six countries in the region after the Berlin Wall opened and Communism fell. He spent six weeks traversing the lands of the former Yugoslavia in 1994, linking Milwaukee Serbs, Croats and Bosnians with their war-torn homeland.
In the fall of 1994, a lifetime of serious television viewing earned him a daily column in the Milwaukee Journal (and, later the Journal Sentinel) focusing on TV and radio. For 15 years, he has chronicled the changes rocking broadcasting, both nationally and in Milwaukee, an effort he continues at OnMilwaukee.com.
When he's not watching TV, Cuprisin enjoys tending to his vegetable garden in the backyard of his home in Whitefish Bay, cooking and traveling.
