Thursday Signal: NBC’s Happy Til It’s Sad

NBC Coverage Scores Big in Ratings

In today’s Signal, NBC’s Olympic coverage breaks viewership records and advertisers are “very, very happy” with the results (though ratings have dropped dramatically now that the Olympics are over, natch); app.net picks up where Twitter’s user-dissatisfaction level drops off; a close-up of how Facebook’s VP of Marketing is seeking advice from senior brand and agency execs; Federated Media — yep, that’s us! — achieved the largest YOY growth in the top 20 U.S. Internet properties, increasing in audience size to 63.6M monthly unique visitors; and last, but not least, the coolest infographic about (what seems like) yesterday that you’ll see today.

To the links ….

NBC: Olympics Is Most Watched U.S. TV Event Ever (Bloomberg) Drawing 219.4M U.S. viewers, the London Olympics TV audience surpassed that of the 2008 games in Beijing to become the nation’s most watched event ever. NBC sold about $1.25B in advertising, beating the $850M sold for the 2008 Olympics. Even though the network acknowledged it lost viewers by not televising more games as they happened, NBC Sports Chairman Mark Lazarus said that advertisers are “very, very happy” with the ratings.

Think App.net is Just a Twitter Clone? Then You’re Missing the Point (GIGAom) App.net’s critics believe that entrepreneur Dalton Caldwell’s project is just a “paid version of Twitter,” but that’s just not so. The impetus for app.net came from the dissatisfaction surrounding Twitter’s clamping down on the use of its API, as well as the feeling that Twitter gave up on its desire to be an information utility and chose to become an advertising-based media entity instead.

Inside Facebook’s Push to Woo Big Advertisers (WSJ) Complaints from advertisers that spending on Facebook isn’t paying off prompted VP of Marketing Carolyn Everson to create a “Client Council,” calling together senior advertising executives from big brands and agencies to give the social network input on advertising and marketing.

Federated Media Publishing Blends Ads, Content (ClickZ) Our recently released Native Conversationalist Suite offers a new and evolutionary group of products to help brands rethink the idea of display media. Plus, as the fastest growing company working with bloggers, and the host of conversational marketing campaigns for 75 of the 100 top brands on AdAge’s list of Leading National Advertisers, we’ve achieved the largest year-over-year growth in the top 20 U.S. Internet properties. Our portfolio of publishing partners increased in audience size from 41.5M to 63.6M monthly unique visitors and expanded beyond technology, lifestyle and business into new categories, including entertainment and music.

The Internet 2002-2012: What a Difference a Decade Makes (VentureBeat) Remember when Friendster was on top and it took 16 seconds to load a page and 12.5 minutes to load one song on a 56k modem? The Internet has come a long way, and there’s no better way to show the change than with an animated infographic, complete with tombstones signifying entities that time and technological developments have laid to rest.

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Hear from more independent publishers, leading players, content creators, and technology executives at the upcoming Signal: Chicago, held September 11th, in Chicago.