I loved the lead in today’s Broadcasting & Cable newsletter in regards to upfronts Flat Is the New Up: “CBS is down 8%, while Fox and ABC are down double-digits — 11% and 15%, respectively. Fourth-place NBC is flat. Buyers expect the networks to ask for CPM inflation increases, but this season’s poor ratings may make higher ticket prices hard to justify.”

But brand advertisers still look to TV for reach, and well positioned TV networks will be in prime position to sell them digital. That was more or less the sentiment offered by Les Moonves earlier this year at the McGraw Hill Media Summit:

We haven’t had original programming since November 20th, that’s a big chunk of time, furthermore we’ve changed our ratings system…so by definition the numbers are different…

We’re more of a mass market mass-medium so ultimately we say you want to buy for national we’ve got that you want to buy local we have billboards we have radio we have local stations…if you have a dollar to spend we can spend the whole dollar for you, we can show you how it can fit for our CBS properties without having to go elsewhere.

And this continues to be the general perception of most network media execs. While media fragments, TV is still the biggest draw. At the same time networks are branching out into digital programming and other advertising platforms which combined with their traditional ad sales should place them in a very competitive position.

For example, I spoke with a FOX executive at the IAB forum last week who mentioned the power of selling MySpace advertising as a digital and international extension. This adds tremendous, measurable value across the board, and is a present day example of media convergence, if not one directly visible to users.

While it’s easy to say new media is hurting networks, because of their entrenched position and scale, it is more likely to help them in the long run so long as they’re smart about integration.