CBS: the more you connect with shows digitally, the more you'll watch traditional prime-time TV.

Is the Internet taking viewers away from TV? No. At least according to a study from CBS.

CBS says that because viewers want to connect more with their favorite TV shows, using Web sites, podcasts, and ringtones of specific programs drive ups prime-time TV viewership.

Wayne Friedman says that CBS' research "only proves the point that networks will continually use the Internet as their marketing partner--a supplemental partner to their own airwaves--to help draw viewers back to see" content on television. "Of course, it doesn't hurt that networks offer up free episodes of their own prime-time programming, all to drive viewers back to their traditional big TV/video screens."

You have to wonder whether conditions will switch entirely. Maybe five years from now CBS will issue another press release saying that the more you watch prime-time TV, the more you'll be using the Internet. Just a thought.