At the start of the 2000s, NBC's fortunes started to take a rapid turn for the worse. That year, NBC's longstanding ratings lead ended as CBS (which had languished in the ratings after losing the NFL) overtook it for first place. In 2001, CBS chose to move its hit reality series Survivor to serve as the anchor of its Thursday night lineup. Its success was taken as a suggestion that NBC's nearly two decades of dominance on Thursday nights could be broken; even so, the strength of Friends, Will & Grace, ER and Just Shoot Me! (the latter of which saw its highest viewership following its move to that night in the 2000–01 season) helped the network continue to lead the Thursday ratings. Between the 2001–02 and 2004–05 seasons, NBC became the first major network to air select dramas in letterbox over its analog broadcast feed; the move was done in the hopes of attracting new viewers, although the network saw only a slight boost. Overall, NBC retook its first-place lead that year, and spent much of the next four years (with the exception of the 2002–03 season, when it was briefly jumped again by CBS for first) in the top spot.
