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‘G.M.A.’ Beats ‘Today’ Over a Full Season

September 27, 2013 by

As Ben Sherwood, the president of ABC News, pushed “Good Morning America” in a heated competition with NBC’s “Today” show for ratings supremacy, he had three goals: first, to win just one week; second, to win one of the television industry’s so-called “sweeps” months; and third, to win for a full television season. He dubbed it “the trifecta” in conversations with colleagues.

And on Friday, ABC achieved it: a full-season win for “G.M.A.” for the first time since the early 1990s.

G.M.A.’s lead over “Today” has been acknowledged several times already, both by the network and by the viewing public. Still, the full-season triumph is something that ABC chose to trumpet on Friday as the network news division positioned itself as one that is growing, or at least holding steady, at a time of fracturing television audiences.

The 2012-13 television season, as measured by Nielsen, started in mid-September 2012 and ended earlier this month. The final seasonal viewership figures for the morning shows were released on Friday. They reflected a once-in-a-generation change: “G.M.A.,” which had lost to “Today” for 852 straight weeks before notching a one-week win in April 2012, has taken a decisive lead among total viewers, with an average of 5.3 million viewers on a typical weekday. That is nearly 700,000 more than the “Today” show, which had an average of 4.6 million.

One season earlier, “Today” had 5.1 million viewers and “G.M.A.” had a little under 4.9 million.

“CBS This Morning,” which was rebooted in early 2012 and is now hosted by Charlie Rose, Gayle King and Norah O’Donnell, had an average viewership of 2.77 million. For CBS, that’s a big improvement: one season earlier, the network had 2.44 million viewers in the mornings.

Among 25- to 54-year-olds, the demographic that really determines success or failure for morning shows, the ratings race remains tight. “G.M.A.” had almost 2 million viewers, about 85,000 more than “Today.”

According to ABC, “G.M.A.” has not led “Today” for a full season since the 1993-1994 season.

Some, though not all, of “G.M.A.’s” gains can be attributed to missteps by the “Today” show, including the dismissal last year of Ann Curry, a longtime member of that show’s cast. “Today” is now trying to lure former viewers back; it has resisted the temptation to dismiss any other cast members, and instead has added two, Willie Geist and Carson Daly. Earlier this month it introduced a remodeled studio and a new graphics package.

Some of “G.M.A.’s” gains can also be attributed to content choices. The show has become more entertaining in the last few years, sometimes eschewing serious news for stories about sensational court cases, celebrities and trends, especially after 7:15 a.m. While its rivals dismiss the show as being too tabloid-oriented, ABC defends its story selections as a reflection of what viewers want to see when they wake up.

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“G.M.A.” has tried not to get too comfortable in first place. Through a spokesman on Friday, Mr. Sherwood said: “Our immediate goals are to keep building on our strengths, to stay hungry and humble, and to keep our eyes on the prize.”

When the 2012-13 season was starting, the “G.M.A.” co-host, Robin Roberts, was in the hospital, undergoing a grueling bone marrow transplant. In February she returned to the show on a part-time basis, but it was not until this month that she resumed hosting full-time.

While the mornings are the most lucrative day part for the network news divisions, the evenings remain essential as well, and there NBC ended the season ahead, as it has for 17 years. “NBC Nightly News” had more than 8.3 million viewers on an average night, 700,000 more than ABC’s “World News.” ABC has crept quite close in the 25- to 54-year-old demographic, however, and in July actually beat the NBC newscast for one week. NBC has avoided a repeat loss since then.

Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/28/business/media/gma-beats-today-over-a-full-season.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

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‘The Voice’ Propels NBC to a Big Ratings Win on Monday Night

September 24, 2013 by

“The Voice” on Monday cemented its status as television’s premier reality competition show, as NBC got off to a strong start in the new television season, according to preliminary ratings figures.

The other rosy news for NBC was the initial showing of the network’s much-talked-about new crime drama, “The Blacklist.” The show, which stars James Spader, posted hit-level numbers for its premiere, averaging more than 12 million viewers and a booming 3.8 rating in the category NBC sells to advertisers, viewers from the ages of 18 to 49.

Even accounting for a slight decline later when official national numbers arrive — because “Blacklist” benefited in its first half-hour Monday from a brief runover from “The Voice” — the performance was among the best in recent seasons for a new drama.

NBC promoted its overall supremacy Monday in the 18-49 competition. It topped its nearest competitor, CBS, by 70 percent with those viewers, which NBC research reported was the biggest margin for any network on a premiere-week Monday since Nielsen Research introduced its People-Meter system in the 1980s.

The next best ratings story from night 1 of the new season was how well Fox’s new drama “Sleepy Hollow” performed in its second week, when it had to face full competition on three other networks. The gothic series involving a reincarnated Ichabod Crane beat everything but “The Voice” in the 9 p.m. hour in that 18-49 competition, including the holdover hits “Two Broke Girls” on CBS and “Dancing With the Stars” on ABC.

“The Voice” remains NBC’s most potent weapon (after “Sunday Night Football”) and performed better in its premiere this season that it did a year ago, perhaps reflecting interest in the return to the original judging foursome, with Christina Aguilera and Cee Lo Green back to join Adam Levine and Blake Shelton.

The show grew to a 4.9 rating in the 18-49 category, up from a 4.2 last year, and to 14.7 million total viewers, up from 12.3 million a year ago.

The impressive performance by “The Blacklist” may be tempered slightly by a ratings decline in its second half-hour, though some of that could also be the product of extra viewers left from the minute or so runover from “The Voice.”

Still, the new NBC drama crushed the latest CBS crime drama, “Hostages,” which had its debut in the same hour. That show, an experiment by CBS in a more serialized drama, may be the season’s first endangered species. It started out with only 7.8 million viewers in its first half-hour (low for CBS) and a 2.0 rating among the 18-49 viewers, then fell to 7.2 million viewers and just a 1.7 rating with those younger adults.

The threat behind that falloff is that the audience will not jump into the serialized story, lose its thread and then abandon the series. The show’s future may hinge on how many viewers chose to record the drama for later viewing.

CBS got good news at the top of the night, with an hourlong premiere for the final season of the comedy “How I Met Your Mother.” It pulled in more than nine million viewers and scored a solid 3.6 rating in the 18-49 group. That was good for second place to “The Voice” in that hour.

But the other CBS comedies fell. “Two Broke Girls” was down to a 2.8 rating from a 3.7 last year in the 18-49 category. That affected the premiere of the new CBS entry “Mom,” which landed with a mediocre 2.5 rating and 7.9 million viewers.

The bad news for ABC was the plunge in ratings for “Dancing,” which started well last week against weaker competition. It reverted on Monday to recent form, drawing big numbers of total viewers — 13.3 million — but losing significant numbers of younger viewers. It dropped 24 percent from last week among the 18-49 viewers, to a 2.3 rating. It finished last in the 9-10 hour in that category.

Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/25/business/media/the-voice-propels-nbc-to-a-big-ratings-win-on-monday-night.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

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Mike Darnell, a Reality Show Creator, Is Leaving Fox

May 24, 2013 by Leave a Comment

Mr. Darnell, who has supervised reality programming for Fox since before the term reality show entered the lexicon, said Friday that he was leaving the network at the end of the month.

He oversaw Fox’s most popular reality shows (“So You Think You Can Dance,” “MasterChef,” “The X Factor” in addition to “Idol”) and was also its most outlandish innovator (remember “Temptation Island” and “Who Wants to Marry a Multi-Millionaire?”).

Mr. Darnell and his superiors at Fox said that he was offered a new contract but decided to leave. Nonetheless, there was immediate speculation that he was a casualty of the tough television season at Fox, particularly with “American Idol.”

Fox’s audiences have fallen by more than 15 percent in the season that ends this month. For “Idol,” once the most popular show on American television, the fall has been steeper. While the slide is not necessarily surprising, since the show has been on for more than a decade, the ratings have been distressing for Fox and its parent company, News Corporation.

When the company reported first-quarter earnings, it said Fox’s ad revenue had declined in large part because of the performance of “Idol.” Now the network is contemplating a complete makeover of the show, possibly by replacing last season’s judges with a panel of “Idol” alumni like Kelly Clarkson and Jennifer Hudson. Such a move would emphasize the past star-making success of the series.

On Friday there were reports that Ms. Hudson, a finalist on the third season of “Idol,” had signed on for the next season, which will start in January; Fox declined to comment.

Mr. Darnell, in a brief telephone interview, warmly recalled the days when “Idol” drew 30 million viewers a night and acknowledged that it would “never be as big as it once was.”

But no other series will be, either, he added: “I don’t think that’s possible in television anymore,” with the exception of a few one-time events like the Super Bowl. He expressed confidence about the future of “Idol,” drawing an analogy between it and the 35-year-old “Saturday Night Live” on NBC.

“How many times have you heard that ‘S.N.L.’ is dead?” he asked. “Then a new crop comes in and it’s a big success again.”

“There’s something about these brands,” he said, asserting that “the audience wants to like them.”

Mr. Darnell, whose title is president of alternative entertainment, gained notice in the TV world for his risk-taking and exuberance. But over-the-top reality TV shows are now less the domain of broadcast networks like Fox than of niche cable channels like TLC and AE. Mr. Darnell has not had a particularly newsworthy show in quite some time. (Franchises he helped birth, however, like “MasterChef,” continue to gain viewers and inspire spinoffs.)

“He brilliantly paved the way for all of us, creating a powerful entertainment genre that audiences can’t get enough of,” said Ryan Seacrest, the host of “American Idol.”

Mr. Darnell, 51, joined the network in 1994 as the director of specials; among the most infamous of those was “Alien Autopsy (Fact or Fiction)” in 1995. In 2000, The New York Times called him “the Svengali of sometimes gruesome, sometimes comical specials that took television to new heights — or depths — of perversity.”

Mr. Darnell said he was leaving to pursue other opportunities, without elaborating. Fox executives emphasized that it was his choice. Rupert Murdoch, the chief executive of News Corporation, said in a news release: “Mike took risks at a critical time and was a pioneering force in shaping the reality programming genre that exists today. He’s a smart and fearless executive who will be missed.”

Mr. Darnell, asked if his exit was related to “Idol’s” ratings weakness, said, “Of course not.”

“Every time my deal comes up, I go through this excruciating decision process,” he said, and this time he concluded he should leave.

“I was able to make this the Wild West,” he said, referring to Fox and its willingness to try stunt shows like “Man vs. Beast” and “World’s Scariest Police Chases.”

“But the Wild West has moved,” he added. “Cable, digital, it’s everywhere now.”

Putting “Idol” aside, he said his best show was “Joe Millionaire,” the 2003 dating competition that tricked female contestants into believing that the aforementioned Joe was a rich bachelor. Joe was actually a construction worker. About 35 million viewers tuned in for the finale.

Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/25/business/media/mike-darnell-a-reality-show-creator-is-leaving-fox.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

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Fox Offers an Early Glimpse of Its New Season

May 9, 2013 by Leave a Comment

The Fox network Wednesday night got a jump on next week’s announcements of new fall television shows by releasing the details of the four new dramas and five new comedies it has ordered for the next television season.

Fox is picking up an unusually high number of new shows, partly because it has seen its momentum in prime time slacken over the past two years as its longtime bellwether show, “American Idol,” has suffered ratings declines.

So Fox is turning to some prominent television creators, including J.J. Abrams (“Lost”), Michael Schur (“Parks and Recreation”), Bill Lawrence (“Scrubs”) and Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci (the “Transformer” movies) for its new roster of shows.

New stars for Fox include Andy Samberg, Andre Braugher, Greg Kinnear, Seth Green, Alexis Bledel and Terry O’Quinn.

Mr. Samberg, the former “Saturday Night Live” star, will headline a new comedy with Mr. Braugher (“Homicide”) called “Brooklyn Nine-Nine,” set in a police precinct and created by Mr. Schur and his “Parks” partner Dan Goor.

Another comedy, “Dads,” stars Mr. Green, along with Giovanni Ribisi, as single guys whose lives are upended when their dads, Martin Mull and Peter Riegert, move in. Seth MacFarlane of “Family Guy” is one of the creators.

“Us and Them” is an American adaptation of the British comedy hit “Gavin and Stacey” and stars Ms. Bledel (“Gilmore Girls”) and Jason Ritter (“Parenthood”) as a couple trying to survive their chaotic friends and family.

“Surviving Jack” is a new comedy from Mr. Lawrence, and it stars Christopher Meloni (“Law Order SVU”) as a father trying to raise a son in the 1990s.

The last new comedy is “Enlisted” which follows three brothers on a small Army base in Florida.

Fox managed to add one new successful drama this season, “The Following,” but it has holes to fill and four new hourlong entries to try to fill them.

Mr. Kinnear will star in a series called “Rake,” an adaptation of an Australian series about a gifted criminal defense lawyer with a self-destructive private life. Peter Tolan (“Rescue Me”) is one of the creators.

The new drama from the prolific Mr. Abrams is “Almost Human,” about police work 35 years in the future when cops are paired with lifelike androids, one of whom, a female, seems to have an emotional connection to her partner, who hates robots.

“Gang Related” is another crime drama, but a contemporary one, set in the world of a Los Angeles gang task force.

Maybe the most intriguing new Fox drama is “Sleepy Hollow,” which is a contemporary reworking of the Washington Irving story, with Ichabod Crane brought back to life to help solve a centuries-old mystery that threatens the future of humanity. It was created by Mr. Kurtzman and Mr. Orci.

Fox will announce its complete new schedule next Monday.

This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: May 9, 2013

An earlier version of this post misspelled the surname of an actress in the cast of “Us and Them,” a new series on Fox. She is Alexis Bledel, not Blendel.

Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/10/business/media/fox-offers-an-early-glimpse-of-its-new-season.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

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Viacom and Time Warner Post Lower Revenue

May 2, 2013 by Leave a Comment

Time Warner, the parent company of HBO, CNN, TNT and TBS, on Wednesday reported revenue of $6.9 billion in the quarter that ended March 31, down 1 percent from the same period last year. Net income grew 23.5 percent, to $720 million, or 75 cents a share, compared with $583 million, or 59 cents a share, in 2012.

Revenue at the company’s Warner Brothers studio fell 4 percent to $2.7 billion, while operating income increased by 23 percent to $263 million. “Both ‘Gangster Squad’ and ‘Jack the Giant Slayer’ fell below our expectations,” Jeffrey L. Bewkes, Time Warner’s chairman and chief executive, told analysts.

He remained optimistic however about the studio’s coming films, including “The Great Gatsby” and “The Hangover Part III.” Warner Brothers had a strong television season with “Revolution,” an apocalyptic drama on NBC, and “Game of Thrones,” the HBO fantasy series that averages 13.4 million viewers per episode.

Viacom felt the impact of a disappointing quarter at Paramount Pictures, which contributed to an 18 percent decline in earnings at the company, to $478 million, or 96 cents a share, versus $1.07 a share in the same three-month period last year. Overall revenue at Viacom fell 6 percent to $3.14 billion mostly because of the film division.

Revenue at Paramount dropped 20 percent to $941 million, a year ago, in part because of the company’s strategy to release only a handful of franchise films each year. Philippe P. Dauman, Viacom’s president and chief executive, said “the year ahead remains strong with audiences eagerly awaiting” releases like “World War Z” and “Star Trek Into Darkness.”

Both companies posted strong quarters in cable television. Mr. Bewkes specifically pointed to the success of Time Warner’s cable division, which benefited this quarter from the average nightly audience of 10.7 million for the N.C.A.A. basketball tournament broadcast on several Turner channels.

Viacom posted a 2 percent drop in operating income at its media networks, which include Nickelodeon, Comedy Central and MTV. Advertising revenue growth of 2 percent and improved ratings at Nickelodeon and Nick Jr. helped Viacom slightly surpass analysts’ expectations. “Nickelodeon rebounded with preschool audiences,” Mr. Dauman said. Combined revenue at the cable channels rose 2 percent to $2.23 billion.

Like Nickelodeon, Time Warner’s CNN cable network has also experienced ratings softness recently. Mr. Bewkes defended CNN under the leadership of Jeff Zucker, the recently named president of CNN Worldwide. But, he said, the channel still needed to evolve from a trusted source of breaking news to a more regularly watched outlet. “CNN can’t just be politics and wars,” Mr. Bewkes said.

Both companies are grappling with a changed television landscape. Online streaming services offered by Netflix, Amazon and Hulu are providing additional avenues of syndication revenue but also, in some cases, competition. Nickelodeon’s revenues had dipped last year in part because children were turning to Netflix to watch a deluge of episodes of “SpongeBob SquarePants.”

Mr. Dauman said Viacom was in “constructive discussions with several parties, including Netflix, concerning digital distribution” agreements beyond an agreement with Netflix that will expire later this month.

Mr. Bewkes rebuffed questions about whether the HBO Go on-demand app would be made available on an à la carte basis through a broadband connection, making the premium cable channel more like the streaming service Netflix. “We would do it if we thought it was in our economic best interest,” Mr. Bewkes said. “At this point, we don’t think it makes sense.”

This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: May 1, 2013

A headline with an earlier version of this article misstated Time Warner’s results. It reported lower revenue, not lower earnings.

Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/02/business/media/viacom-and-time-warner-post-lower-earnings.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

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GSN Considers Adding Church-Based Dating Show

April 10, 2013 by Leave a Comment

At an “upfront” breakfast in Midtown Manhattan on Tuesday morning, GSN outlined its plans for the 2013-14 television season, a season that is being reshaped by the popularity of “The American Bible Challenge,” which was introduced during the 2012-13 season and is already back for a second go-round.

Still, GSN executives told reporters they were not planning on creating a channel dominated by faith-based programming. The network, they said, will continue to offer viewers secular shows like “Baggage”; “Family Feud,” in a new iteration with Steve Harvey as the host; “Minute to Win It,” which will have its debut on June 25 with original episodes and a new host, the Olympian Apolo Anton Ohno; and “The Newlywed Game,” also in a new iteration, with Sherri Shepherd as the host.

“We still need to be a broad-based channel,” said Amy Introcaso-Davis, executive vice president for programming and development at GSN.

Even so, the success of “The American Bible Challenge,” hosted by Jeff Foxworthy, is hard to ignore.

“Literally, it put us ahead of the game in the year’s most talked-about programming trend,” Ms. Introcaso-Davis said, referring to the renewed interest among viewers in programming with religious themes like “The Bible,” the miniseries on the History Channel.

“The American Bible Challenge” is the most-watched series in GSN’s history, Ms. Introcaso-Davis said, and “in general, it doubles” the ratings “of anything we’ve ever done.”

The increased viewership for the Bible game show, along with more conventional shows like “Family Feud,” helped GSN’s ratings grow among adults ages 18 to 49 as well as adults ages 25 to 54.

And GSN is enjoying “much greater interest from the advertising community,” said John Zaccario, executive vice president for advertising sales, adding that he and his colleagues had “signed over 100 new advertisers.”

The proposed dating show with a religious setting, called “It Takes a Church,” will ask congregations, pastors, friends and family to find a suitable potential mate for a parishioner who is single. Plans call for hourlong episodes if it becomes a series.

The show is a contemporary version of how “the ladies of the church are always trying to fix up the few single” parishioners, Ms. Introcaso-Davis said, and would be “aimed specifically at that new audience” that has been brought to GSN by “The American Bible Challenge.”

“It Takes a Church” is one of six original series in development at GSN, which, like most cable channels, is trying to significantly increase the amount of original programming on its schedule to woo additional viewers and advertisers.

The other series being considered by GSN include:

¶ Another dating show, “Where Have You Been All My Life,” which asks a contestant to evaluate three potential suitors based on information about their pasts, using sources like photographs and video clips.

¶ “Dance Rivals,” about two dance studios in Orem, Utah, that compete fiercely against each other, which includes as an executive producer Derek Hough, a professional dancer in the cast of “Dancing With the Stars” on ABC. (“Dance Rivals” is in the vein of the handful of reality series that GSN schedules, which executives refer to as “real-life games.”)

¶ “The Imposter,” which asks two contestants to live with a family for 48 hours and figure out which family member is a fake, planted by the producers. The contestant who identifies the imposter wins $25,000; if the imposter is not found, the family wins the cash.

GSN is ordering two game shows as series. One is the new version of “Minute to Win It” with Mr. Ohno; GSN showed reruns of episodes of the original version, hosted by Guy Fieri, after they appeared on NBC.

The other show being ordered by GSN is “The Chase,” based on a popular British quiz show that pits four contestants against a cast member known as the Beast — a know-it-all who seeks to answer questions faster and more accurately than the contestants can.

GSN is ordering eight hourlong episodes of “The Chase,” which will make its American debut later this year.

GSN is the most recent in a roster of cable channels that have made or are planning to make their 2013-14 upfront presentations, so called because the events take place before the start of the coming TV season.

The lengthy schedule of presentations is to conclude during the week of May 13 when the big broadcast networks, along with Spanish-language networks and channels, make their presentations.

Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/10/business/media/gsn-considers-adding-church-based-dating-show.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

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In a Gloomy Economy, TV Sitcoms Are Making a Comeback

October 24, 2011 by Leave a Comment

For the better part of a decade, while drama became more ambitious, and reality shows became more outrageous, comedy had the worst track record in prime time.

As recently as 2008, only two comedies ranked among the top 10 shows at this point in a new television season. Two years earlier, the total was zero.

But comedy has surged back this fall, elbowing past those other genres to reclaim supremacy among viewers. So far this season, sitcoms occupy seven of the top 10 spots among entertainment programs (not counting football) in the category of most financial importance to network executives — viewers ages 18 to 49.

Two shows, “New Girl” on Fox and “2 Broke Girls” on CBS, are brand-new hits. And new comedies have shown promising signs on both other networks: “Suburgatory” and “Last Man Standing” on ABC and “Up All Night” on NBC.

At the same time, several longer-running comedies have expanded their popularity. “Two and a Half Men” on CBS benefited from the publicity that surrounded the noisy departure of Charlie Sheen. Its ratings numbers are up 65 percent (though much came in its first two weeks.)

“How I Met Your Mother” on CBS is up 23 percent, and yet another CBS comedy, “The Big Bang Theory,” is up 8 percent. (CBS has four of those top seven comedies). And ABC’s “Modern Family,” fresh off an Emmy sweep, has improved 25 percent. In the past week, it nudged past “Men” to rank as the top-rated comedy.

In looking for a turning point in the comedy comeback, many fingers point to that three-year-old ABC comedy. Jennifer Salke, the president of NBC Entertainment, said, “ ‘Modern Family’ is at the center of it, just the sheer excellence of it.”

Kevin Reilly, the president of Fox entertainment, said that “Modern Family” seemed to “revive the confidence of the creative community — I definitely feel more vibrancy in comedy now.”

Paul Lee, the entertainment head at ABC, noted that CBS had all along had comedies that were “immensely strong” but, he said “Modern Family” took it “to another level, elevating the genre.”

Part of the reason was the way in which “Modern Family,” achieved success by coming out of nowhere. ABC was moribund in comedy until it secured the sitcom about the daily absurdities visited on three interrelated families.

The pilot was a sensation, validating ABC’s bold scheduling strategy: four new comedies on Wednesday, with “Modern Family” in the center. The show was a hit from its first episode.

That pattern rang familiar to television executives like Warren Littlefield, the former top programmer at NBC, who was around for a previous era of comedy downturn in the 1980s.

“We had come out of the era of the relevant comedies of Norman Lear,” he said, referring to the creator of “All in the Family” among many other comedy hits. “It was a comedy desert. Nobody had transitioned to the next phase. Then Bill Cosby changed all that by illuminating the family comedy with his point of view.”

Mr. Littlefield said “Modern Family” is playing the same role that “The Cosby Show” did in “examining the family, but it’s a family we haven’t seen before.”

Still, timing played a hand. As Nina Tassler, the president of CBS Entertainment, noted, it would be inaccurate to describe comedy as a desert this time, because CBS had several consistent hits, thanks largely to Chuck Lorre, who created three of them.

But as Mr. Lee described it, “comedy had lain fallow for a long time.” Mr. Reilly called the output “truly anemic, except for CBS.”

The cycle of entertainment interest shifted, starting about 2000. Drama soared; reality exploded. But, as usual, after a long run, those genres began to get played out, a trend especially notable this season.

“I feel like the appetite for reality has come down a bit,” said Ms. Salke. “And after shows like ‘Lost’ and ‘24,’ the bigger ideas for drama became harder and harder.”

Article source: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=41aff164aa28e5b7421daada23fe6e8f

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