Leaving Jericho

Arabelle's Alley was born from a desire to showcase the Save Jericho campaign in May of 2007; it then evolved into an outlet for Jericho news and information.

This chapter of the Jericho saga is finished. Jericho has been cancelled by the people who can't see the future so it is time for me to move on.

All content will be left online for viewing but I will not continue to post. I would like to thank everyone who contributed, commented, dugg, and those who were faithful readers.

JerichoMonster will remain active but, in coming weeks, will have a different look and broader scope. Jericho will continue to be a part of the Monster.

My friend, Beth, and I are happy to have a new blog named Margie and Edna's Basement. Margie and Edna are fictional characters created by Beth and myself. They have lived in Jericho, Kansas all their lives but have decided it's time for them to branch out beyond their beloved town. We hope you will follow their hilarious adventures.

Special Announcement

Special announcement:

We are Margie and Edna. We have lived in Jericho, Kansas all our lives but we've decided it's time for us to branch out beyond our beloved town.

We'll still keep you informed of all the gossip-I mean the goings on here in town-but we're also going to talk about anything and everything else.

Please visit us at our new blog: Margie and Edna's Basement.

We do love having company.



"Fox passed CBS as the most-watched television network after its "American Idol" singing contest topped ratings and the Hollywood writers strike limited competition from scripted shows.

Fox's 6.8 rating among U.S. households in primetime for the season through March 16 snatched the lead from CBS Corp., according to Nielsen Media Research. CBS has been first for five consecutive seasons, Nielsen spokesman Gary Holmes said."

Jericho: Social Networking

"Some suggestions on how the Jericho fans could use social networking to get the word out about their show."


"Endings are hard. One of the most unusual things about American television is that success equals an endlessly deferred ending, an aspect I’ve previously discussed as the “infinity model” of storytelling. In other countries, most shows have a limited term with a clear understanding that a show ending is an important part of its run. But in the U.S., most shows keep going until the ratings erode or the producers pull the plug. One of the many things to love about The Wire is that the producers had a finite scope in mind, and that HBO allowed it to play out despite weak ratings (not that HBO cares about ratings per se)."

Season Finale ??

"OK, here’s my immediate thoughts on tonight’s episode.

First, who else noticed that at the end of the “coming next week” promo, it called it the “SEASON FINALE”??? Are they trying to tell us the good news that way or are they just trying to keep us guessing?"

**** I think CBS is jerking us around.****



What is a Widget?

"We're talking about small, fairly straightforward applications that can run on your desktop or online: floating clock faces, scoreboards, weather monitors and so on. Think of them as miniature, portable web experiences that can be installed on your computer or -- increasingly -- embedded in MySpace or Facebook pages, in personalized home pages such as iGoogle, or on blogs."

Marketing TV

I'm posting early today as severe storms are supposed to arrive by afternoon.
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"Wherever people of similar interests congregate marketers are soon to follow. It happened with newspapers and radio. Then in the 1960s broadcast television ushered in the great era of advertising which was followed 25 years later by the proliferation of cable programming.

The requirement to segment an audience for targeting and tailoring of message is the driver of communications. Gender…cultural background…age…income…topics of interest...these demographics and considerations influence nearly $300 billion in advertising expenditures a year in the United States."



"CBS' experiment with a spring season of "Big Brother" may not be attracting huge crowds, but the network wants the reality staple back for the summer.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, CBS is still planning on another installment of "Big Brother" for the summer, with the show's 10th season running essentially back-to-back with the current "Big Brother: 'Til Death Do Us Part."

Changing Television

"Television, as we know it, is changing as we know it. Think about it. Talk to anyone who was born before Television even existed and they’ll tell you how much it’s changed since its inception. Talk to anyone who was born within the last 40 years, and they’ll tell you things have changed since even they’ve been around. Color television was only introduced into households in the mid 1950’s early 1960’s, but very few shows were actually filmed and broadcast in color, though NBC’s ‘Ford Theatre’ became the first color filmed series in October 1954."




" There are so many websites with LOST theories. Almost every little detail is analyzed and each time I read a new theory I discover meaning behind things I didn’t even notice.

And of course no one knows if he or she is right.

What we experience is, I think, one big puzzle (”Second Degree White Belt Sudoko“). So if you want to read up on some theories and have your own brilliant ideas, you absolutely need to check first “what is already know”, unfortunately that is more than a day-task. Here is a by-far-not-complete-list of 20 LOST sites that you can scan completely for info. On these sites you will find links to dozens of other (official) LOST sites and communities."

Nutty Nielsens

More on Nutty Nielsen ratings.

"Nielsen recently announced time frames for two major data initiatives, including a new "enhanced weighting" procedure that has the potential of generating differences in ratings estimates effective with the next television season. Nielsen said it will revise the algorithms it uses to weight national ratings beginning in September 2008, and that the revision would likely have an effect on both program and average commercial minute audience estimates."
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"Nielsen's calculation systems are so complex, especially since they've weighted people in the database so that a person is not a simple person. A person is 1.1 on one day and 1.5 on another day," Brooks explains, adding, "Therefore, when they do multiple calculations they run the risk that people who were heavily weighted in the 'live' sample, may not be in the playback sample."

Nielsen Out-Of-Home

"The Nielsen Co. has begun to get some traction for its newest research services that are designed to analyze TV viewing beyond the traditional home-bound TV screen. In a first-of-its kind agreement announced Thursday, Zenith Media Services has signed for three new Nielsen services, becoming the first subscriber to the Nielsen Out-of-Home Report.

Set to launch next month, the Out-of-Home Report is a joint service of Nielsen and Integrated Media Measurement that uses a cell phone-based methodology to track TV viewing outside the home in bars, hotels, airports and other locations. "




"Most Lost fans have a favorite character, or even a few favorites. Now all of the Locke fans, Kate admirers, and Ben disciples can settle their differences--March Madness-style. Since March 7th, the Washington Post has been hosting Lost Madness, a bracket-like poll to determine the best all-time Lost character."

Lost and Moonves

Thanks, Amy, for the Lost recap.

"So more lies and more coverups, people. Some are speculating that maybe Jin is still back on the island, presumably with the other survivors, but given that this gravesite visit was a private one, I’m guessing that Jin is really, truly dead in the future.

The question is: What happened to him? And why did Sun have to lie about him dying in the crash?

And, oh yeah, WHO THE HECK ROUNDS OUT THE SIXERS?!? Is it indeed Claire’s son, Aaron? Or were the writers teasing us, and is another member yet to be revealed? Producers Cuse and Lindeoff have some explaining to do…"




"Speaking at the Bear Stearns Media conference in Palm Beach, Fla., CBS CEO Les Moonves said he's surprised by Rupert Murdoch's slowdown comments. If CBS has seen any ad sales drop, he says, it's been offset by political spending.

On the eve of the Hulu launch, Les also criticized his competitors' attempts to go online, though he didn't call anyone out by name. He said he doesn't want to see just a regurgitation of programming on the Web. CBS should put interactive programming on the Web, not just replays of TV shows. This sounds an awful lot like what CBS digital boss Quincy Smith has been saying.

Three to four years from now we'll have $750 million in digital revenue primarily from CBS properties spread out across the Internet.

Online is going to grow in leaps and bounds, but certain things work better in certain mediums. Says he doesn't want the Internet to just be TV on a smaller screen.

Psychologically people are saying that Showtime is the new HBO."

Charter Goes Nielsen

"The Nielsen Co. has struck a deal with Charter Communications to analyze set-top box data from 330,000 homes in the Los Angeles area, the parties said today.

Nielsen has similar agreements with other undisclosed MSOs but the Charter deal goes a step further in that it licenses the ratings company to also create ratings reports from the data that it can then sell to clients. Nielsen said such reports would be available to clients starting in the second quarter of 2008. Adweek is a unit of Nielsen.

Charter struck a similar deal in November 2006 with Nielsen competitor TNS Media Research, which sells reports based on the Charter set-top box data to clients via a syndicated package it calls TotalView. Publicis Groupe's Starcom was the first media agency to sign up and other buyers and sellers of TV time have signed up since then.

Set-top box viewing data has attracted a lot of interest from agencies and their clients who are looking for more detailed analyses about the TV viewing patterns of the consumers they reach with ads. Set-top box data has the potential to offer more detail because it offers a second-by-second look at how viewers watch, as opposed to the minute-by-minute view offered by the current Nielsen national ratings service."

Stand and Fight

Jericho: Episodes and Clips

"Using DVR and TiVo does help. Remember CBS shows are advertiser supported shows and so skipping though commercials means the advertisers can more easily ignore you. On the other hand they can’t tell if you’re off making a quick snack or got up to let the dog out. Ratings track how far after the air date a show is viewed and the sooner the better. When possible try to watch in the first three days, and failing that within the first seven.

Online viewing of episodes has CBS’ attention (and the Jericho writers actually get paid for them now). Episodes and clips can be viewed here.



SciFi Channel shows confidence in Jericho by turning over this Friday’s lineup to Jericho.

Starting at 8/7c this Friday SciFi airs Jericho for four full hours of primetime programming. The episodes start with Rogue River, Crossroads, Red Flag, and end with Vox Populi.

Nielsen Monopoly and Sampling

""The digital set-top box represents the Holy Grail for marketers; a virtual treasure-trove of TV viewing data -- if it can be effectively harnessed.

It could also mean the end of Nielsen Media Research's monopoly over the $600 million TV ratings business, if TNS, Comscore, ErinMedia or a host of other startups have their way.

An example of that is the skirmishes with Florida-based ErinMedia, which has developed technology it believes will make the concept of a "Nielsen Family" obsolete.

The company is in the middle of an antitrust suit against Nielsen in which it argues Nielsen's longterm, staggered contracts with media companies prevents others from entering the ratings market."
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"Mistakes in Sampling
And there are mistakes. Mistakes that have forced advertisers to lose money. Nielsen has acknowledged, for example, that in Los Angeles that fault rates for Hispanic households have been 27% higher than the rest of the sample. Audits by the Media Rating Council also found that Nielsen’s local people meter system used in New York failed to record viewing data from over 25% of African American homes in the sample.

I have only come across three people who were invited to be a part of the Nielsen family through People Meters and diaries used during sweeps period. All three admitted that with their busy schedules and viewing patterns it was hard to know what they actually watched. In addition, they often forgot to write down what they watched and decided to simply fill in the blanks with their favorites. One couple with a People Meter was on vacation and kept their television on PBS during their whole vacation in hopes of helping the non-commercial station.

In an effort to please advertisers and critics, Nielsen has been doing a few things that it believes are making them a little smarter. While its efforts can be applauded, some of the steps remained flawed."

Bringing Back The Monster: Season 3

" Bringing new life to the monster."

"Save season 3 initiatives are starting to spring up for Jericho. In chat rooms, on message boards and through private message the call is sounding throughout the Jericho fandom to be proactive and act before any decision is made about the show. There are a number of fantastic resources we can visit or revisit as we think about which tactics we personally will employ to keep our show alive."



"Welcome to the News & Information Update site for the New Home 4 Dresden Petition & Campaign!"

Another One Bites The Dust

Ben Silverman is probably hating Nina Tassler these days.

Not because he's the chief programmer of NBC and she's the chief programmer of CBS. But Tassler is at least partly, albeit indirectly, responsible for the fact that Silverman is being buried under baby booties.

Silverman has angered "Las Vegas" fans because he canceled the show. Not just because he canceled it, but because the final episode was no finale at all — it ended on a cliffhanger involving Delinda Deline (Molly Sims) being pregnant.

Which precipitated "The Save Las Vegas/Operation: Baby Booties" campaign. Which was in no small part inspired by what happened at CBS last year."



"AT&T has joined two venture capital firms and a Hollywood talent agency to invest in new digital media companies, reports The New York Times.

The VC firms are Accel Partners and Venrock; the agency is William Morris. The partnership seeks companies interested in developing entertainment content and technology.

AT&T hopes to get in early among technologies that might improve the ease with which ads are run on mobile devices."

Online Videos

"Everyone knows most online videos are watched at work. Right?

No, they're not, says CBS. The broadcaster says its online viewership peaks twice each night -- once at 7pm on the east coast, and then again three hours later, when west coast viewers get home.Veoh has told us a similar story, which may mean that while most video is watched during the day, certain types of video -- presumably longer clips or full shows -- are not.

For CBS, viewing for individual shows online tends to peak right before a new episode airs, as fans catch up on ones they've missed. The downside: The more people watch at night, the more likely they are to cut back on honest-to-goodness prime time television, which is much more valuable for the network. CBS execs say that's inevitable, but that it hasn't yet affected ratings."




"Disney is going to raid the TV archives, a move that may allow viewers to watch 50s-era series like "Zorro" and "Davy Crockett" via ad-supported streams or by paid downloads through Apple's iTunes, CEO Bob Iger said at Disney's annual meeting.

Iger didn't actually say which shows from the ABC/Disney library would make a digital comeback, but it's clear he's eyeing the free money discovered by CBS and NBC, both of which have been pleasantly surprised at the online popularity of oldies like "The A-Team" and "Star Trek." Vintage shows cost the networks nothing to repurpose and they can be packed with ads."

Jericho: Sedition and More

"CBS today posted the press releases for the next two episodes of Jericho, named “Termination for Cause” and “Sedition.” I’ll let you read through them and find the surprises yourselves, but please take a special note of the guest cast in “Sedition.”




"As a filmmaker, I truly appreciate the films and television shows that are able to take me out of the “business” and into the story. Jericho is one of those shows and that is why I am happy to tell everyone about it. 24 captured an audience with excellent writing, acting, producing, directing, and a unique story. With Jack Bauer not returning until January of 2009, Jericho is set even more so now to capture a number of the audience that once faithfully tuned into 24. Hopefully, CBS will market the next three episodes well, run the series again during the summer to capture a greater audience, and then come back in the fall with a full season of episodes."

Oversight: Recap

"DON’T EVEN THINK ABOUT READING PAST THIS SENTENCE IF YOU HAVEN’T WATCHED EPISODE 4, “OVERSIGHT.”

There’s no crying on Remote Access, consider yourself warned.

They freakin’ killed Bonnie!!

I didn’t see it coming until Bonnie didn’t follow Mimi into the pantry.

But how badass was Bonnie, killing every J&R goon except Goetz? She was incredible! I have to say, if I had to go out, I’d want to go out just like her."



Beautiful tribute to Bonnie Richmond.

See it here.

Journeyman On YouTube

"A Save Journeyman Youtube Channel has been created.

See it here.



"A while back we wrote about the campaign by "Jericho" fans to save the series from cancellation — they sent thousands of nuts to CBS execs (related to a line in the season finale). Now fans of the soap opera "As the World Turns" are gearing up to send kisses to CBS execs. Hershey's kisses, that is. Fill in your own Reeses joke here ...

Fans of the fictional romance between Luke Snyder and Noah Mayer are baffled about why the two characters haven’t kissed on-screen since September, wondering whether it’s a sign of squeamishness by CBS or show sponsors Procter & Gamble Co."

The fans have started a letter-writing campaign, posted an online petition and even have a Web site that counts the days, hours, minutes and seconds since Luke and Noah last locked lips."

March Madness: Journeyman

Journeyman fans need help. March Madness. Great idea.


"Announcing Journeyman March Madness: This is the first week of Journeyman March Madness and we need your help to turn up the fan volume! This week, our target is the press. We're asking each fan to visit this thread and then write at least one email to the press about Journeyman and its campaign. If you've got contact info for more press, post it there for all the fans to use. Check back each week for more Journeyman March Madness Events."

Journeyman episodes are also available on Mondays on savejourneyman.net



Another new fan blogs Jericho.

"I've discovered a new show (to me)!

Jericho.

It's awesome and filled with so much glorious writing, fleshed out characters, and tough tension-filled situations. It took a few episodes for me to really get into it, as the first few felt slightly forced/awkward in parts. It is *so* worth it to continue on. Never underestimate the human factor or evil corporation's power to royally frack everything over."

Watching Journeyman

Here's a brief interview with Kricka who loves Jericho and Journeyman. I appreciate her comments and will have more from other fans this week.



1. What makes you love Journeyman?

For me, Journeyman was one of those shows that got lost in the mix of new shows this season. I had wanted to catch it because I love a good time travel story. So, I checked it out online and was hooked right from the start. Kevin McKidd as Dan Vasser had a strength and kindness, and a strong love for his family that I found very appealing. As the season went on, the stories became more twisty and we started to get some very interesting answers to his time travel, and his reasons to try and help these people. Many people compared this show to Quantum Leap at the beginning (as did I), but it was so much more than that, because Dan had a whole life and family that directly impacted his new ability to travel. And, like most shows I come to love, it is smart, it is real, and it was obviously conceived by someone (Kevin Falls) who was just as invested in the characters and story and I was.


2. Can people watch episodes online? Where?

Unfortunately, NBC.com has pulled the full episodes from their site, but all 13 episodes that were produced can be found for free on hulu.com and on veoh.com, and are still for sale on iTunes and Amazon's Unbox.

3. Why does Journeyman deserve another chance?

The creator, Kevin Falls, gave us a big present by wrapping up some of the questions in the 13th episode, for fear that the show wouldn't make it past the original 13 episode order, but he did leave plenty of room for more. After watching all 13 several times (I can't help it, when I get obsessed, I am obsessed), I am sick to death of really good shows being yanked without any effort from the networks. NBC smashed us over the head again and again with the Bionic Woman, a show that was seriously flawed and never seemed to recover, yet they barely even mentioned Journeyman right from the start. By the last few episodes, it was as if NBC didn't even know it was still on! The show never really got a chance, and I really think it deserved one. TV viewers do want good TV. There is definitely an audience for a show like this if it had been promoted at all by NBC. NBC has gotten a rep for giving good shows a shot (see: Friday Night Lights, 30 Rock, et al), and I wish they hadn't just shoved this one under the rug.

Jericho Streaming

New Jericho Photos



The Veoh.com site is used by more than 23 million viewers per month. It allows viewers to watch streaming web video from across the Web. Jericho included.




"But now that Nielsen wants households to let it eavesdrop on many more activities — from Web surfing to cellphone use — how far will people open their doors?

In one potential setback to its ambitious modernization plan, Nielsen last year ran tests to determine the willingness of its television-monitoring households to allow electronic tracking of a second behavior, Web usage. So many people said no because of privacy concerns that Nielsen said this month it would scale back the plan — for now, at least — making the Web tracking optional."

CBS: Not Most Watched

I think Moonves and CBS need to open some eyes.


"If you spend any time watching CBS you’ll hear them celebrate the fact that CBS is the most watched network. It’s no longer true though. FOX is the most watched network in primetime and its lead is growing.

CBS can certainly proclaim “The MOST watched network among people age 55 and over!”, but outside of that, Les Moonves and the crew at the Eye network have nothing to crow about."



"Not knowing is better than knowing bad news, but seriously, the suspense over the future life or death of “Friday Night Lights”has become excruciating.

To ease the tension, ardent fans are on the march, hoping to force NBC to give “Lights” a chance. Some 40,000 pounds of peanuts saved CBS’s “Jericho,” but will thousands of plastic footballs do the trick for “Lights?”

That’s the goal of the official rescue Web site, www.SaveFridayNightLights.tv, which urges supporters to swamp the office of NBC entertainment chief Ben Silverman with petitions and, yep, little toy footballs. As of mid-February, about 7,000 mini-footballs had been tossed the waffling execs way."