NBC announced on January 10, 2010, that the Jay Leno Show will no longer air at 10 p.m.http://blogs.wsj.com/speakeasy/2010/01/10/jay-leno-show-out-at-10-pm-a-brief-history-of-the-press-releases/ According to reports, Leno will return as host of The Tonight Show, replacing Conan O'Brien, who has hosted the show since Leno's departure.http://www.tmz.com/2010/01/14/jay-leno-conan-obrien-nbc-the-tonight-show/

O'Brien is leaving the network with a $33 million buyout and his staff will be receiving a total of $12 million in severance. His last show will be on Friday, January 22, 2010. The network has said that Leno's first Tonight Show will air on March 1, 2010 following the broadcast of the 2010 Winter Olympics.http://tv.yahoo.com/the-tonight-show-with-conan-o-39-brien/show/44070/news/tv-news.en.ap.org/tv-news.en.ap.org-20100121-us_tv_leno_o_brien While Leno's primetime show debuted to much fanfare last fall, the show's ratings have steadily declined. Conan O'Brien has also fared poorly since taking over The Tonight Show.

In a statement released on January 12, 2010, O’Brien expressed that he would not accept the later time slot, saying “I sincerely believe that delaying the Tonight Show into the next day to accommodate another comedy program will seriously damage what I consider to be the greatest franchise in the history of broadcasting.” Conan went on to explain his feelings, adding that moving the show to 12:05 would also negatively impact his friend Jimmy Fallon’s Late Night show.http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/12/conan-obrien-statement-i_n_420521.html

Both Leno and O'Brien have let loose with disparaging remarks about NBC in their monologues. Leno referred to NBC's primetime lineup as a "complete disaster"http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/11/leno-announces-his-show-w_n_419524.html while O'Brien said that compared to NBC, the porn industry was "a classier business with better people".http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/12/conan-blasts-nbc-over-tonight-show_n_419586.html On April 12, 2010, O'Brien announced that he would begin hosting a new late night talk show on cable network TBS. According to reports, the new show will air Monday through Thursday at 11:00 pm.http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100412/ap_on_en_tv/us_tv_conan_o_brien

Jay Leno's primetime show premiered in September 2009. The show follows a very similar layout to The Tonight Show, but only features guests a couple of times a week. Instead, there are segments based on popular sketches Leno developed during his time at The Tonight Show. The 10 PM time slot has been a problem in competing against scripted programming on other networks.

Conan O'Brien took over as host of The Tonight Show in June 2009. He has performed well as host, but the new version of the show has been losing viewership to rival David Letterman for the past few months.http://starcasm.net/archives/30464