As reported first yesterday at PWTorch.com, and now confirmed by The Hollywood Reporter, due to Nielson Media Research equipment failure, Raw's audience levels were underreported this week.
In fact, USA Network's ratings were off the entire week of July 28-Aug. 1.
PWTorch records show that Law & Order which precedes Raw on Monday nights has averaged a 2.07 rating the four Mondays before this past Monday, whereas it drew a 1.71 rating this Monday. If that percentage roughly holds for Raw, then Raw's rating will turn out to be a 2.8 rather than the 2.5 reported.
However, because Raw had not drawn a rating less than the 3.4 rating it drew each of the previous three weeks in the past nine years in the summer months, it's likely the actual Raw rating was above 3.0. But because Law & Order's reported rating was only 17 percent lower than the previous four week average, it seems based on that limited information that it's unlikely the Raw rating was underreported by enough to get it back to the 3.4 range. Nielson is working on a way to recapture the lost information, a Nielsen spokesman said Friday.
So the actual rating for this week's Raw may never be known. This Monday's rating will be one of the more anticipated in years as it will reveal whether Raw's audience has truly eroded even more than it had the previous three weeks when it drew relatively lousy 3.4 ratings.
http://www.pwtorch.com/artman/publish/article_21177.shtml
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