Fox’s public criticisms of the Nielsen ratings service have become the latest knock to the age-old system of counting how many people watch primetime shows Read the full post.
May 19
2009
05:16 PM ET
Is it time for Nielsen ratings to go?
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I keep trying to figure out how the Nielsen kids measure all their numbers, and we learned in stats all about a healthy percentage of error, and 8% just seems like too much. In a show with 20+ million viewers, that’s a huge difference. I don’t know why TVs just send anonymous data to anonymous companies that measure TV traffic; I’d take the invasion of privacy if my favorite shows didn’t get cancelled over (possibly) flawed numbers. TV is changing, and I think that the way we measure viewers needs to change with it.
The Nielson rating system is antiquated. I can understand that networks need those numbers to attract sponsors, but the entire system needs to be retooled to include DVR recordings.
I think I’ll just quit my job and focus on fixing this ratings problem. Whoever comes up with a great solution is going to be a billionaire. Ahhhh. I can dream, can’t I? Anyhoo, Nielsen has never been accurate. The sample size has always been to small. My boyfriend and his family participated once. Nielsen sent them the box you connect to your TV. He said it was a big waste of time.
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I agree, the Nielsons are archaic, outdated and we need a new system. I am a HUGE TV fan and yet I don’t own a tv. I watch Chuck, Heroes, Lost, Smallville, Flight of the Choncords, 30 Rock, Battlestar Galactica, Mad Men and Sarah Connor Chronicles. I do one of two things, I either buy them off of iTunes or I watch them online. Cable TV is totally outdated. If cable offered a buy what you want to watch plan or a buy a certain number of hours plan, I would get a tv and cable. But it doesn’t. It’s literally less than 1/2 the price of basic cable for me if I just spend 1.99 on each episode of something I want to watch on iTunes or buy a season pass. If it’s not on there, I watch online for free. And how do my viewing habits get counted? They don’t. And I’m not alone. Most all of my friends watch tv in the same manner. Or, as is becoming more popular, just waiting till the season comes out on DVD, Netflix it, and watch the whole season at once, uninterrupted and no commericial!
I’ve never known a Nielson family — but I have over the years filled out a 2-week diary a few times. Wouldn’t it be great if they did figure out a way to truly count viewers and it was discovered that all the reality dwreck that’s on is the lowest ratings getters???
This is all a bunch of garbage. Who else is going to spend the millions of dollar necessary to set up the infrastructure Nielsen already has in place? Nielsen just needs to update their system. Why not tap into the information available from DVRs and cable/satellite boxes (you know they’re tracking out viewing habits).
Yes, I agree the neilsen ratings system needs to either go or be overhauled in order for any accurate numbers to exist. The thing is, unless the networks find a way to better understand the viewers better, those real numbers are not going to be all that great either.
They are just completely out of touch with us. How can they expect to keep loyal viewers when shows often jump time slots & nights with barely a mention. Then you have the shows that go MIA for months, only to reappear without a hint of promotion. And my favorite is the show that airs three times & disappears into the television abyss. (How exactly can we become loyal to a show in just two or three episodes?)
The other major problem is they just don’t listen! The exec’s think they know what is best when in reality, THE VIWERS VOICE should be the most important. In order for things to change, the exec’s need to suck up those monster ego’s and finally get a clue. We, the viewers, are ALWAYS right!
Either get rid of the Neilsen rating system altogether or give it a complete overhaul. In my thirty-nine years, I’ve never known a Neisel family. Just track via Tivo or DVR or cable systems. Neilsen is just plain outdated.
I wrote a blog about this a few months ago: Let’s Calculate Television Program Ratings a New Way ( http://cjcs.com/tib/2848/lets-calculate-television-program-ratings-a-new-way/ )
The idea was to make ratings more pro-active by the viewers and still be applicable to broadcast, cable, dvr, web, disc, and other viewing methods while still sticking with the one-person/one-vote idea.
To the posters who talk about how they use DVR, why would networks want to count you? If you are watching with your DVR you aren’t watching the commercials, which is how they make the money to pay for the shows?
I love TV and have always hated that the viewing choices that I, and everyone I know, make have NO bearing on what stays or goes. Why don’t the networks let viewers just vote (like we do for Idol, or DWTS) as to what we want to see renewed each year. It would probably be as effective as the ridiculous Nielsen system.
AND, why on earth do the networks bother even advertising their shows (print, billboard, etc) when 99% of the consumers that view the ads have no way to be counted as viewers.
Just. Plain. Dumb.
Yes, Nielsen monitors Tv’s, DVR’s, Games,VCRs, Dvd’s, everything !!!!
The problem is not WHAT people watch. It is WHO is watching. Read the article. That is the 8% error.
Figure out how to tell when someone is actually looking/watching/viewing a show and not being distracted, and you will solve the problem .
So Nielsens system is off up to 8% for WHO is watching. Come up with a better way of counting WHO is watching 24/7, no mistakes, and you will be rich
I went out last night and came back to find my dog Nina watching TV. Because she doesn’t know how to work the remote, she was watching “Southland” on NBC, instead of her favorite “House Hunters” on the Home and Garden network. The Nielsen ratings are coming under criticism lately because the new technology is making its system of calculating the number of people watching certain shows obsolete. DVR’s and online Internet viewing are skewing the numbers – some estimates indicate that the Nielsen ratings are off by as much as 11%. One group that is getting counted: pets.
http://www.paulsolomon.blogspot.com
I definitely think it’s time for the Nielson Ratings to go. The last time those people called me and I told them I had no minors living in the house, the woman on the other end of the line hung up without so much as a ‘thank you for your time.’ This whole idea that a television shows fate being decided solely on the basis of ten-thousand families with 2.4 kids or whatever the name is, as well a token handful of college kids, is ridiculous. The majority of households now have cable boxes and I don’t see why those couldn’t be used to see what people are actually watching. Surely the technology exists. I know some people would cry about being “spied” on but since nothing illegal is being broadcast I don’t see what the problem would be. Pay-per-view shows could and should be excluded from statistics, so no one need know about anyone’s late-night porn viewing habits, and maybe there could be an option for people to opt out of having their viewing habits recorded entirely. Even if the tech doesn’t exist right now, surely it’s coming in the near future. I for one would definitely be opting in to have my viewing habits recorded, since I’d want to keep my favorite shows alive a s long as possible.