"Tonight Show" Ratings Falling Post Leno

There was a time when "The Tonight Show" and its ratings were number one in late night but not so much anymore. Since Conan O'Brien took over the late night hosting gig on the show at the end of May it has lost almost 2 million viewers. This of course is great news for David letterman who has been out stripping "The Tonight Show" in the ratings for a while now. As of the week ending on September 4th "Late Night" has garnered a larger audience for the 9th week in a row. It averaged 3.42 million viewers that week compared to the 2.89 That "The Tonight Show" got. While Conan O'Brien has managed to increase the number of younger viewers who watch the show (ratings are up about 26% among 18-24 year old's) the overall number of viewers keeps dropping. The biggest winner in all this may be ABC's "Nightline" which manages to acquire a larger audience than both "The Tonight Show" and "Latenight" on a regular basis and has moved into the number one spot. Some viewers have expressed that they find Conan O'Brien a little too high strung and his comedy a little too low brow as compared to Jay Leno.