Sci Fi Exec Urges Fans to "Watch It Live"

Today’s Stargate panel at Comic Con packed the hall with nearly 5000 fans, many of whom had stayed through all the panels of the day to be there. Their enthusiasm seemed at odds with the lackluster ratings the shows suffered for this season’s premieres. Asked whether there would be a Season 11 of SG-1, Sci Fi Exec Nora O’Brien, the VP in charge of SG-1, said it was totally up to the ratings. She urged everyone in the audience to watch all Sci Fi programming live, saying TiVo, or digital recording of the show for later viewing, is [negatively] affecting the ratings. Gary Jones asked who in the audience TiVo’s the show, and about a quarter of the people raised their hands. Although Nielsen does measure TiVo playback, apparently it doesn’t count the same as real-time viewing, perhaps because advertisers assume (rightly of course) that TiVo viewers skip over the commercials.

Later Producer/Writer Joe Mallozzi said he’d done some calculations, and if everyone of Gateworld’s 20,000 members would convince 100 others to watch the show, then it would be renewed. That would hint that 2 million is their target rating in number of viewers.

Ms. O’Brien seems very dedicated to the show personally and wants it to continue, but everything is bound up in the Nielsens, right or wrong.
A complete report on Comic Con will follow here soon!