CBS

Failing to live up to Monday’s high ratings standards, the sitcom from Will & Grace co-creators David Kohan and Max Mutchnick gets the network’s second cancellation of the season. Comedy repeats will take over the time slot.

With Gineral Motors on the sidelines, the average price for a 30-second spot hits a record $3.8 million with 5% of the inventory left. CBS expects a sell-out, and more than $225 million in revenue.

CBS is looking to further expand its NCIS franchise with another spinoff. The untitled project, written/executive produced by NCIS and NCIS: Los Angeles executive producer Shane Brennan, is a planted spinoff from NCIS: LA, which Brennan created and on which he is showrunner

The freshman drama series about Sherlock Holmes starring Jonny Lee Miller as Holmes and Lucy Liu as his sidekick, Dr. Joan Watson, is getting the post-Super Bowl broadcast slot in February.

The deal falls short of what other broadcast networks provide. ABC, NBC and Fox, whose parent companies own Hulu, offer recently aired episodes, while the new CBS deal covers only shows that are no longer on the air.

Both earning positive reviews and solid ratings in their respective 10 p.m. slots, the new Tuesday and Thursday dramas get the network’s first back-nine orders of the fall.

The path for CBS chief Leslie Moonves’ efforts to thwart Dish Network’s Auto Hop seemed easy enough. Moonves could simply threaten Dish in a carriage negotiation to abandon the commercial-skipper or else CBS would keep the stations it owns off the satellite operator. But, the chance for CBS to exert that leverage and control its destiny, as it were, appears to be off the table for a good while. Instead, Moonves and CBS look to be at the mercy of the federal courts.

Today, two prominent media analysts issued reports expressing concern about the new season. So far, few new shows have taken off and ratings have tumbled at ABC, CBS and Fox in the adults 18-49 demographic that advertisers covet. Both CBS and Fox are off by more than 20% while ABC is down 13%.

After just two episodes on CBS’sFriday night block, the network has pulled the plug on Made in Jersey. Unscripted series Undercover Boss will premiere in its place Nov. 2.

The pact with the satellite distributor covers retransmission consent for CBS-owned stations and continued carriage of Showtime, CBS Sports Network and Smithsonian Channel. Terms of the new deal haven’t been released.

It’s fitting that Dispatch Broadcast Group’s settlement of a carriage dispute with Dish Network came when it did, for today marks 20 years since the passage of the Cable Television Consumer Protection and Competition Act, the measure that created retransmission consent and a second revenue stream that is now critical to local television.

Breaking from two decades of tradition, this year’s election exit poll is set to include surveys of voters in 31 states, not all 50 as it has for the past five presidential elections, according to multiple people involved in the planning.

The American Federation of Musicians’ complaint is that its performers haven’t been given a pay raise or healthcare increases in seven years on live-audience network shows. So the AFM is protesting outside The Tonight Show, Dancing With The Stars, Today, Good Morning America, The Late Show With David Letterman and Jimmy Kimmel Live.

TV’s Fall Season is “anachronistic artifact,” according to NBC research chief Alan Wurtzel, who says it’s now a 52-week business. Nontheless, the tradition endures, so the networks are battling to get a leg up on the competiion this week with show premieres.

ABC’s Modern Family and Showtime’s Homeland were the big winners for Sunday night’s Emmy Awards broadcast on ABC. An Emmy win by Jon Cryer, star of Two and a Half Men” on CBS, for best actor in a comedy, surprised even him.

CBS Corp. CEO Les Moonvees says he’d like to own a general cable net, but only at the right price. He also likes sports — but only deals that make money.

All broadcasters should follow the lead of CBS’s Leslie Moonves and threaten to use their retrans clout to come down hard on Dish Network and the Auto Hop commercial-skipping feature of its Hopper DVR. Allowing subscribers to skip all spots in recorded programs at the touch of a button is a broadcasting killer.

Dish Network CEO Joseph Clayton picked up the gauntlet that CBS chief Leslie Moonves threw down yesterday when he threatened to pull CBS from the satellite system if it continues to market its ad-zapping Hopper DVR. Dish CEO Joseph Clayton said: “Give the customer choice and control. Give the customer a better experience and we all win.”

CBS CEO Leslie Moonves says the company will ultimately drop its flagship network from Dish Network unless the satellite operator discontinues its Auto Hop ad-skipping device. CBS is in litigation, along with other broadcast networks, trying to thwart the device.

In a new report, Sanford C. Bernstein analyst Todd Juenger says CBS is anticipating revenue of $1 billion in 2016 from retransmission consent fees from cable and satellite operators and their own affiliates. CBS had previously said it wouldn’t hit that number until 2017.

60 Minutes, The Amazing Race, The Good Wife and The Mentalist see adjustments on seven different days during the upcoming season to better accommodate NFL overage on Sunday nights.

New agreements extend the affiliations for nine of  the 11 CBS affiliates that Nexstar owns or operates. The agreements are good through the end of 2018.

CBS’s Big Brother was last night’s No. 1 entertainment show. And NBC led the coverage of the Democratic National Convention at 10 p.m., averaging a 2.1 in the hour. The 10 p.m. information from Nielsen is based on non-time zone-adjusted fast nationals and only measures the 10 p.m. hour. Obama’s speech went a bit past 11 p.m.

The stocks of several entertainment conglomerates continue to fly high.The shares of Walt Disney and News Corp. hit new 52-week highs on Thursday, while CBS Corp.’s stock closed near its high for the past year. The stock gains came as U.S. stock indices like the Dow hit multi-year highs as the European Central Bank approved new measures to fight the debt crisis in several Southern European countries.

CBS is expected to announce today that its Super Bowl ad slots are more than 90% sold out. The announcement comes five months before the game’s broadcast on Feb. 3, 2013. The 30-second slots are going for a record $3.7 million to $3.8 million vs. an average $3.5 million during the 2012 broadcast on NBC. If CBS sells 60 slots, revenue could exceed $225 million. Among the biggest repeat advertisers: Anheuser-Busch, PepsiCo, Frito-Lay and Hyundai.