Has Cramer jumped the shark?

America is getting tired of James J. Cramer's act. That's the conclusion I draw from mediabistro.com's recent report on the decline in the ratings for Cramer's Mad Money. Cramer's ratings dropped 29% from 2006 -- he fell below 200,000 total viewers at 6pm in May -- averaging 175,000 for the month -- by contrast his May 2006 average was 247,000 viewers. Moreover, his viewership has been dropping in the last few months -- In March, he averaged 255,000, and in April, he averaged 205,000.

To his credit, unlike fellow prime time business buffoon, Donald Trump, Cramer does not even try to create the illusion that he has hair. But I think Cramer jumped the shark as he was writing his self-pitying New York Magazine article which came out last month.

While Mad Money helped pump up interest in the stock market, individual investors are still a sideshow to the current market action. It's institutions, private equity firms, and hedge funds that rule the roost. And they march to a different drummer.

So unless Cramer can totally retool his act -- or perform the miracle of consistently making stock picks that beat the market -- he'll slowly fade into the sunset.

Peter Cohan is President of Peter S. Cohan & Associates, a management consulting and venture capital firm. He also teaches management at Babson College and edits The Cohan Letter.