by David Gura

Conan O'Brien's
Noel Vasquez/Getty Images North America

Who's laughing now?

This morning, the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences announced this year's nominees for prime-time Emmy Awards.

Perhaps the most-notable nod — the nod of greatest note? — was in the "Variety, Music or Comedy Series" category:

The Tonight Show With Conan O'Brien (you read that right) is up against The Colbert Report, The Daily Show, Real Time With Bill Maher, and Saturday Night Live.

Here is how the Associate Press put it: "Conan O'Brien is gone from 'The Tonight Show' but his short tenure as host is not forgotten: The late-night show with him at the helm nabbed a nomination as best variety, music or comedy series, while resurrected Jay Leno was snubbed in the category."

In The New York Times yesterday, Bill Carter reported on an alarming trend in late-night television.

"Six months after NBC's disastrous late-night experiment ended, Jay Leno is back at 11:30 and back on top in the ratings," he wrote. "But all is not well in the kingdom of late night."

For a multitude of reasons having to do with changing technology, changing viewing habits, and a proliferation of similar shows, the world of the network late-night talk show is getting tougher and tougher to navigate.

Mr. Leno saw his ratings for the second quarter shrink sharply from the same period two years ago and his margin over his longtime competitor, David Letterman on CBS, reduced to its smallest level since 1995. But Mr. Letterman’s numbers have declined as well. The only network talk show in the 11:30 hour to add viewers was "Jimmy Kimmel Live" on ABC, which gained about 150,000 over last year.