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Cable operators deliver thousands of programming hours to their customers every day, but what portion of those hours are actually devoted to programming?
Court TV provided an answer during its recent upfront preview breakfast in New York, by releasing Nielsen Media Research numbers on the amount of non-program time per prime-time hour (ads, public service messages and promos for upcoming shows) on individual cable channels. The material was obtained from Nielsen's "Minute X Minute" report, covering calendar year 2003. Of the 42 ad-supported services mentioned in Court's roundup, 27 offer 15 minutes or less of non-program content per hour. Only one (AMC) unspooled less than 10 minutes of non-program content per hour. Court TV, according to this study, has more than 14 minutes per hour.
The numbers were produced by coming up with non-program material time at each channel over four-week clumps, then averaging the weekly results and dividing that figure by 21 (number of primetime hours per week).
--Simon Applebaum
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