FOX’s “American Idol” was the top TV program of 2008, according to Nielsen.  Tuesday night broadcasts of “American Idol,” through December 7, drew 15.5% of U.S. TV households, on average, while Wednesday night “American Idol” broadcasts drew an average of 15.3% of all TV households.

Viewers with DVR access gave NBC’s “Heroes” the biggest bump any primetime program received in 2008.  The average TV audience for “Heroes” increased by 35% when timeshifted viewing within seven days of a program’s original air date was factored into Nielsen’s ratings.  FOX’s “Fringe” and ABC’s “Lost” also drew large audience boosts — +26% and +25%, respectively — from DVR viewers.

The 2008 Superbowl, which drew 43.1% of all U.S. TV households, was the most popular single telecast of 2008. 

Top 10 TV Programs – Regularly Scheduled

Top 10 TV Programs – Single Telecast

Top 10 “Timeshifted” Primetime TV Programs

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Relive the greatest hits of 2008 — stay tuned on Nielsen Wire for more Tops In 2008 coverage.

Look ahead to the new year with Nielsen Wire’s 2009 Industry Outlook series.

But according to Nielsen, many of China’s advertisers took a break from advertising in August, sending overall ad spending in China tumbling to levels last seen in May 2008, when the Sichuan earthquake hit and advertising was suspended for three days.

Advertising spending in China grew, year over year, by just 7% in August, Nielsen reported Monday.  In comparison, China’s ad spending grew by an average of 19% in the seven months leading up to the Olympic Games.

In August, sponsor advertising grew by 40% — or RMB2.8 billion (US$370 million) in China, but that increase was not enough to compensate for the withdrawal of the rest of the market’s advertisers.

“This is quite unprecedented, based on our monitoring of advertising behavior and spending for previous Olympic Games.  Rather than attempt to battle it out with the Sponsors, other players opted simply to ’sit out’ the month of August,” Richard Basil-Jones, Managing Director, Media Asia Pacific, Nielsen, noted.  “With the London Games four years out, time will tell whether this was a situation unique to China, or whether in the future, other non-Sponsors will chose to sit on the side lines, leaving the Games open and clear for Sponsors to enjoy maximum cut through in an unusually uncluttered advertising environment.”

Despite the ongoing global financial turmoil, advertisers returned to China’s ad market after the Olympic Games.  In September, ad spending in China registered healthy, near pre-Games growth of 16%, according to Nielsen.

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Read coverage of Nielsen’s findings in the Financial Times.

Two-thirds (66%) of adults in Columbus reported being “very” interested in at least one of the 29 sports measured by Scarborough, including the major leagues, motor sports, college sports, minor leagues, and the Olympics, among others.

Boston (64%), Buffalo (63%), and Pittsburgh (63%) rounded out the top sports markets.

Nationally, 56% of all adults are avid sports fans, according to Scarborough.

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According to a 16-market survey conducted by Nielsen after the Olympics’ opening and closing ceremonies, consumers throughout the world are increasingly interested in traveling to mainland China. 

Forty-five percent of those surveyed after the Opening ceremony said they intended to travel to mainland China at some point.  Following the Closing Ceremony, that percentage increased to 51%.  For 80% of the respondents, who had never visited mainland China, it would their first trip to the country.

Meanwhile, respondents who said they had no interest in visiting mainland China dropped from one-third, after the Opening Ceremony, to one-quarter, following the Closing Ceremony. 

Interest in visiting mainland China was highest in neighboring Hong Kong (86%), Singapore (86%), and India (80%).  Large percentages of repondents in Mexico (72%), Taiwan (69%), South Africa (69%) and South Korea (66%) also expressed desire to travel to China.

Positive impressions of China, generated by global Olympics TV coverage, may account for the surging interest in travel to the country, Grace Pan, head of leisure and travel research, Nielsen China, noted. 

“According to the World Tourism Organization, China will be the world’s largest tourist destination by 2020 receiving 137 million overseas tourists in 2020, and in the meantime and generating 100 million outbound tourists of their own,” Pan said.  “With the Beijing Olympics generating such strong interest in China, they may well reach these numbers earlier than anticipated.”

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Read China Daily’s coverage of Nielsen’s findings.

According to a survey conducted by Nielsen after the closing ceremony, seven in 10 viewers across 16 countries and territories said Beijing appeared more “modern” and “high-tech” than they had expected.

Beijing also looked cleaner and greener than many viewers expected — 56% said the city’s physical environment exceeded their expectations.

Nine in 10 foreigners who visited Beijing for the Olympics also told Nielsen the city’s Olympics venues were “good” or “very good.”

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Read The Wall Street Journal’s coverage of Nielsen’s findings.

Between August 8 and August 24, 4.7 billion viewers — or 70% of the world’s population — tuned in to watch the Games, according to Nielsen.  In comparison, 3.9 billion watched the 2004 Athens Games, while 3.6 billion followed the 2000 Sydney Games on TV. 

Host nation China led the viewing with 94% of Chinese viewers tuning in to the Olympics TV coverage, Nielsen reported.  South Korea, though a much less populous nation, also recorded 94% audience reach.  Mexico followed closely with 93% of all viewers in that country following the Olympics on TV.

In the U.S., the Summer Games ranked as the most-viewed TV event ever, with a total audience of 211 million and an average daily audience of 27 million people.

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Read coverage of Nielsen’s findings in The Hollywood Reporter, Multichannel News, The Huffington Post, and on Bloomberg.

Meanwhile, Olympics fans who logged on to the Internet to follow the events around the clock set a new online precedent during the Games,  Nielsen Online reported Wednesday.

Olympics Web Portals
In the U.S., NBC, an official broadcast partner for the event, drew an average of 18 million (week one) to 18.9 million unique visitors (week two) to its Olympics website during the Games.

Yahoo’s Olympics section drove more traffic than NBC’s site, but visitors to NBCOlympics.com spent twice as much time on the site and looked at three times more content than visitors to Yahoo’s Olympics site, according to Nielsen.

In China, approximately 85% of all Internet users who went online during the Games viewed Olympics content, according to ChinaRank, a website ranking platform hosted by the Internet Society of China and a Nielsen Online partner.

On average, 62 million unique browsers viewed Olympics content each day, and during the course of the Games, Chinese Internet users viewed more than 11.4 billion pages of content across 200 Olympics-related sites tracked by ChinaRank.

Sina Olympics was easily the most popular Olympics Web portal among Chinese Internet users, drawing an average of 30.9 million unique browsers each day.  Tencent Olympics (17.9 million average daily browsers) and Sohu Olympics (12.5 million average daily browers) were, respectively, the second- and third-ranked Chinese Olympics Web portals.

Online Video
NBC’s Olympics video site drew more than 1.2 million unique visitors per day, with dramatic traffic spikes around noon on work days.  Online video use was significant during the Beijing Games, but it did not appear to negatively affect TV viewing in the U.S., which remained at record levels during the Games.

Olympics Buzz
U.S. swimmer Michael Phelps’ dramatic gold-medal winning streak triggered a barrage blog chatter.  Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt also wowed Olympics fans, but Phelps, who received five times more online buzz than Bolt, proved unbeatable in the blogsphere.

Online Advertising
U.S. Olympics team sponsors drove 9.9 billion online ad impressions before and during the Beijing Games (August 4 – 24).  AT&T, General Motors, and Bank of America were the top three advertisers, accounting for a combined total of more than 1 billion impressions.

View Nielsen’s complete Olympics online findings.

But McCain got much more bang for his advertising bucks, according to an analysis by Nielsen IAG.

Nielsen’s survey of 1,600 likely general election voters who watched the Beijing Games found that McCain’s Olympic ads more effectively communicated a basic message, were recalled by more viewers, and triggered a larger intent-to-vote increase among viewers than ads run by Obama’s campaign. 

On average, the two McCain ads that were surveyed — “Celebrity” and “Washington’s Broken” – were recalled by 52% of those polled.  In comparison, just 40% recalled Obama’s two ads, “Hands That Built This Nation” and “It Begins With a Plan.”

That huge lead in general recall translated into a 10% net boost in intent to vote for McCain, while Obama received only a 7% lift from his Olympics TV ads.

There was some good news for Obama — his Olympics ads were apparently “more likable” than McCain’s.  Forty-five percent of Nielsen respondents said they liked Obama’s Olympics ads, while just 33% said they liked McCain’s.

The telecast drew an average audience of 11.1 million viewers, while CBS’s “NCIS” and FOX’s “House” were ranked second and third, respectively, with 7.5 million and 6.8 million average viewers each.

Coverage of the second night of the Democratic National Convention on NBC and ABC also made the top ten.

Overall, NBC won the night with an average audience of just over 9.2 million viewers, while FOX took second place with 5.8 million average viewers.  CBS and ABC claimed third and fourth places — with just over 5.7 million and 5 million average viewers, respectively.  Univision followed in fifth place with an average audience of just over 4.7 million viewers.