Things must be getting pretty desperate over at Oprah Winfrey’s fledgling OWN Network for the former talk show titan to tweet this out to her nine-million followers:
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OWN’s ratings have improved some over last year when it launched, but the network still isn’t pulling in as many viewers as the network it replaced, Discovery Health, which was doing poorly enough to be, uhm, replaced. Considering Oprah’s brand and the expectations that come with it, OWN has been nothing but a disappointment — and an expensive one.
Oprah only has herself to blame, though. Hiring someone as disliked and divisive as Rosie O’Donnell to be one of the faces of the network has turned out to be a disaster. After only a few months on the air, Rosie’s show has already had to be revamped and viewership has gone over a cliff.
As of now, only 200,000 tune in for Rosie, which is awfully close to a statistical zero.