Subject: When did '24' jump the shark?

I was a huge fan of the show 24 during its run and I watched it every week, from start to finish.  I never did get into Die Another Day or Legacy however because they both feel a lot more like the later seasons of the show than the earlier seasons, which were some of the best television I have ever watched.  Was anybody else into that show and when do you think it jumped the shark?

I would say the beginning of season 6, when a nuclear bomb was detonated in Los Angeles only four episodes in.  After that, there was nothing the season or the entire show could do that would top that.  The rest of season 6 was a big mess.  Seasons 7 and 8 were better than 6 but still well below seasons 1-5 in quality.  Season 4 was the weakest of the first five but season 5 was the best in the entire series in my opinion.  After the fourth episode of season 6, there was nothing more they could do and the show really should have ended once that plotline was resolved.

This brings me to something that I dislike about American television compared to say British television.  Any successful serial drama or even sitcom will hit a point in its run where the writers run out of ideas and the show loses a lot of what once made it so great.  In America, producers will milk shows until they can't any more, so they usually end up lasting many years beyond their time (think "Friends" which lasted until 2004 or "The Office" which was amazing for about 4-5 years and then totally fell off a cliff).  In Britain, writers come up with a complete story they want to tell and they end the show after that.  In doing that, it is assured that the show is great from start to finish and doesn't have the 'golden ages' followed by decline into irrelevancy before cancellation that American shows do.