The Sponsor Ledger

Who pays for the news · cumulative capture · as of 2026-08-15

Read this first — four things, before the counts

These counts are cumulative across 2031 capture sessions — every ad break the desk has logged on three channels, accreting as the recorder runs. Capture was not continuous: each channel’s counts are counts of its captured hours (stated per channel below), not of the network’s full air. Still not a representative sample of any network’s ad economics.
The counts are uneven by tape length (CNN 7610 ad blocks, MS NOW 6862, Fox News 7088). No cross-channel ranking should be read into these numbers; a bigger count here is more captured hours, not a finding about a network.
Categorization is automated — each ad is machine-labeled, so a category line is a rough cut, not a hand-audited taxonomy.
The desk reports what aired and who paid for it: ad-load, category mix, top advertisers, and the ad copy itself. These are counts and shares — never a verdict on the networks.

21560ad blocks logged across three channels over 1500 captured hours (2031 sessions, not continuous). Each figure below is a count or a share of that tape — what aired and who bought it — never a charge against the channel it ran on.

Most of the desk’s beat is the coverage. This rail is simpler and more mechanical: it counts the ad breaks and who bought them. For each channel it logs how much of the airtime was advertising, which categories of advertiser showed up most, and who ran the most spots — then it prints the ad copy so the count is something a reader can check, not something the desk asserts. It follows the money and stops there; what a reader makes of who is paying is their own.

CNN

Counts below are over 486.7 captured hours across 792 sessions — capture was not continuous.

29%of program+ad time was ads

4096.2ad minutes

10145.9program minutes

7610ad blocks logged (n)

Category mix · airings by category

legal940insurance897financial773pharma553food521streaming285auto267software262charity189

Top advertisers · airings over 486.7 captured hours

Advertiser	Category	Airings
Optima Tax Relief	legal	221
Ethos	insurance	211
Tax Relief Advocates	legal	178
Ramp	streaming	152
Wesley Financial Group	legal	143
Robinhood	financial	132

MS NOW

Counts below are over 499.6 captured hours across 678 sessions — capture was not continuous.

26%of program+ad time was ads

3770.3ad minutes

10829.7program minutes

6862ad blocks logged (n)

Category mix · airings by category

legal956insurance699financial618food519pharma387education321streaming282auto276software211

Top advertisers · airings over 499.6 captured hours

Advertiser	Category	Airings
Ethos	insurance	210
Wesley Financial Group	legal	194
Optima Tax Relief	legal	189
University of Maryland Global Campus	education	175
Tax Relief Advocates	legal	164
California Psychics	psychic	155

Fox News

Counts below are over 513.7 captured hours across 561 sessions — capture was not continuous.

27%of program+ad time was ads

3893.4ad minutes

10632.2program minutes

7088ad blocks logged (n)

Category mix · airings by category

insurance892legal819financial669pharma538food361streaming272auto271software243charity144

Top advertisers · airings over 513.7 captured hours

Advertiser	Category	Airings
Ethos	insurance	181
Rush Tax Resolution	tax	175
Tax Relief Advocates	legal	161
California Psychics	services	149
Optima Tax Relief	legal	142
Wesley Financial Group	legal	128

The receipts

A short verbatim line from the top advertisers’ own ad copy, pulled from the transcript the desk logged. This is what “the desk counts what actually aired” means in practice — the receipt is the ad itself.

“Hey, I'm Mike Slater.”

Ethos insurance 677 airings

“They tell you to be afraid, to be scared, and they try to frighten you into calling.”

Tax Relief Advocates legal 572 airings

“National Intelligence as a The tax code is famously complicated.”

Optima Tax Relief legal 560 airings

“Calls select quote at 1-800-242-3311 for your free quote today.”

Wesley Financial Group legal 474 airings

“Learn more at Advocaspays.”

California Psychics psychic 419 airings

[OUTPUT] Sponsor Ledger: 21560 ad blocks logged across 3 channels over 1500 captured hours (2031 sessions, not continuous) — per channel, ad-load (ad vs program minutes), category mix by airings, and top named advertisers, with verbatim ad-copy receipts. Cumulative captured tape, not continuous and not a network’s ad economics; counts, never a verdict. probability mass ≠ 1.0.