Just as some of us are trying to figure out why NBC is claiming that the pilot for "Nobody's Watching" was downloaded more than 600,000 times on YouTube (because YouTube's own numbers say that more than 391,000 viewed the first third of the pilot and about 161,000 apiece viewed Parts 2 and 3), along comes NBC Research president Alan Wurtzel to explain what's up with "generations and media use."

And while it's no great surprise that Wurtzel dismisses the over-61 set as "matures" ("no disrespect...they're just not at the central core of what we do"), his timing is a bit odd.

That's because the previous session was devoted to NBC's new sitcom, "Twenty Good Years," which stars John Lithgow, 60, and Jeffrey Tambor, 62, as lifelong friends who decided to seize the day because they figure they only have "20 good years" left.

It's not what you might expect from NBC, which contributed more than its share of shows about twenty- and thirtysomething singles -- not that there's anything wrong with that -- and prides itself on only talking about its 18- to 49-year-old viewers.

There could be a reason for that -- comedy may not be dead, but as the networks dole out the time slots sparingly, they seem to be stressing experience -- yet Wurtzel's Power Point presentation suggests Research is still chasing the young viewers.

He's just called Gen Y, for instance, "the most interesting group in our society today," only to add in the next breath that two-thirds of them live at home (presumably with parents) and that they tend to have less money.

They may be straddling the line between boomers and "matures," but Lithgow and Tambor are doing better than that, I suspect.