NEW YORK - The weekly television ratings competition is no competition with the start of the Summer Olympics.
NBC won easily with its Olympics coverage. Friday's opening ceremony drew more than 40 million viewers, numbers that were about the same as for the Grammy and Academy awards ceremonies this year, and far more than anything else on U.S. television this summer.
The Nielsen company said the first two nights of competition that followed had NBC getting bigger audiences than they had in the Beijing Olympics four years ago.
NBC's average audience for the week was four times its closest challenger, CBS.
