Even In Nielsen Ratings Victory, Nbc Loses Ground

NBC is still top dog, but its bark is a little quieter.

The No. 1 network won its 10th straight “sweeps” ratings period and its second consecutive season ratings race, Nielsen Media Research announced.

Yet even in victory, NBC lost more than 10 percent of its audience from a year ago as cable channels continued to steal viewers from the networks.

In the May sweeps, which ended Wednesday, NBC scored a 10.6 rating, down from 11.9 last May. CBS was second with a 10.2 (a marked improvement from last year’s 9.6), ABC was third with a 9.0 (a drop from 9.3) and Fox was fourth with a 7.3 (up a hair from 7.2).

Each rating point represents 970,000 households.

The 1996-97 regular season also ended Wednesday, and NBC finished first with a 10.5 rating, down from 11.7 in 1995-96. CBS was second with a 9.6 (the same number as last season, when it finished third), ABC was third with a 9.2 (a disastrous fall from 10.6), and Fox was fourth with a 7.7 (up from 7.3).

Overall, the four major networks lost 5.6 percent of their audience from a year ago.

Letterman will go to Olympics

David Letterman, who packed his mom, Dorothy, off to the 1994 Olympic Winter Games in Lillehammer, Norway, is taking his entire “Late Show” to the ‘98 winter games in Nagano, Japan.

“I’m thrilled that the network has offered us this incredible opportunity,” Letterman said. “There’s nothing like doing a show after a 12-hour flight and a minibar full of sake.”

Letterman’s CBS late-nighter will preview the Olympics for a week before heading to Japan to do the show there Feb. 16-20 - the heart of the February ratings sweep.

Mrs. Letterman’s nightly reports from Lillehammer, including interviews with first lady Hillary Clinton, skater Nancy Kerrigan and Gen. Norman Schwarzkopf, put her on the top of the pop-culture chart.

There’s no word yet whether she’ll participate in the Nagano trip.