Cincinnati remains America's top-rated Survivor market, even though CBS' Survivor wasn't the No. 1 show on Thursday night.

        For the first time since going head-to-head on Thursday, NBC's comedies drew a larger national audience, according to preliminary Neilsen Media ratings.

        NBC's Friends and Will & Grace averaged a combined 14.8 rating and 21.5 percent audience share from 8:45-9:45 p.m. Thursday, after the telecast of President George W. Bush's press conference.

        The premiere of Survivor: Africa debuted with 13.6 rating and 20 percent audience share. CBS says more than 23.7 million viewers watched the program.

        In Greater Cincinnati, Survivor: Africa ratings (26.6) almost doubled the national average. And the Tristate rating far exceeded CBS' other top markets: Pittsburgh (20.2), St. Louis (20.1), Nashville (19.5), Portland, Ore. (19.2), Louisville (19.1), Philadelphia (18.9), San Diego (18.5), Las Vegas (18.5) and Fort Myers (18.4).

        The Survivor 3 audience here was slightly bigger than the local ratings on Feb. 1, the Thursday premiere for Survivor: The Australian Outback (26.2) with Crittenden's Rodger Bingham, and the first day it competed directly with Friends.

        But Survivor 3 ratings dropped 23 percent nationally compared to Feb. 1, according to the daily “Programming Insider” newsletter from Media Week.

        “Insider” columnist Marc Berman also noted that ratings for the Survivor 3 debut were 25 percent higher than the original Survivor premiere on Wednesday, May 30, 2000.

        Mr. Berman praised NBC “forrevitalizing Friends with a story line about Ross (David Schwimmer) being the father of Rachel's (Jennifer Anniston) baby. He also congratulated CBS for a sold second-place finish, “bucking the latest trend” of low ratings for unscripted real-people dramas “and keeping its mega-Survivor franchise very much still alive.”

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