Nielsen ratings

[Franchise22]

in both wrestling threads, ratings is a recurring topic. with that said, how is this even an accepted method of measuring who is watching ANY program? i watch certain shows, but it doesnt matter. read the following for how flawed the system really is:

 

 

 

A criticism of the measuring system itself is that it fails the most important criteria of a sample: it is not random in the statistical sense of the word. Only a small fraction of the population is selected and only those that actually accept are used as the sample size. There are only 25,000 total American households that participate in the Nielsen daily metered system. The number of U.S. television households as of 2009 is 114,500,000. As a result, the total number of Nielsen homes only amounts to 0.02183% of the total American television households, meaning that 99.97817% of American households have no input at all into what is actually being watched. Compounding matters is the fact that of the sample data that is collected, advertisers will not pay for time shifted (recorded for replay at a different time) programs rendering the 'raw' numbers useless. In many local areas, the difference between a rating that keeps a show on the air and one that will cancel it is so small as to be statistically insignificant, and yet the show that just happens to get the higher rating will survive. As the possible choices increase so does the margin of error resulting in the sampling sizes being too small.

 

Another criticism of the Nielsen ratings system is its lack of a system for measuring television audiences in environments outside the home, such as college dormitories, transport terminals, bars, and other public places where television is frequently viewed, often by large numbers of people in a common setting. In 2005, Nielsen announced plans to incorporate viewing by away-from-home college students into its sample. Internet TV viewing is another rapidly growing market for which Nielsen Ratings fail to account for viewer impact. Apple iTunes, atomfilms, YouTube, and some of the networks' own websites (e.g., ABC.com, CBS.com) provide full-length web-based programming, either subscription-based or ad-supported. Though web sites can already track popularity of a site and the referring page, they can't track viewer demographics. To both track this and expand their market research offerings, Nielsen purchased NetRatings in 2007.

[eayragt]

Because it gives an approximation. Which is all you're ever going to get. So it's "acceptable" to use.

 

Does it give an accurate answer? No. Do Nielsen ensure that there are boxes in a representive variety of households? Yes. Is there anything better to use? No.

 

I'm not sure what the last two paragraphs have to do with your point - the copy and paste may have gone on a little too far.

[Franchise22]

Because it gives an approximation. Which is all you're ever going to get. So it's "acceptable" to use.

 

Does it give an accurate answer? No. Do Nielsen ensure that there are boxes in a representive variety of households? Yes. Is there anything better to use? No.

 

I'm not sure what the last two paragraphs have to do with your point - the copy and paste may have gone on a little too far.

 

you see, i dont think it does give a good approximation. Too many vairable not included. as for the last 2 paragraphs, i added them to show another type of issue, but after re-reading, i removed them.

[CQI13]

Although he exaggerates, Charles Barkley has a point:

 

The rating system is full of s—….You can’t give three people in this room a box and assume 5,000 or 10,000 are watching the same thing. I can tell you if they gave me and my boy Kenny (Smith) a box, ‘Sanford and Son’ would have been the No. 1 show in the Nielsen ratings!

[lazorbeak]

Because it gives an approximation. Which is all you're ever going to get. So it's "acceptable" to use.

 

Does it give an accurate answer? No. Do Nielsen ensure that there are boxes in a representive variety of households? Yes. Is there anything better to use? No.

I'm not sure what the last two paragraphs have to do with your point - the copy and paste may have gone on a little too far.

 

Why isn't there? This isn't 1960. We're not using tube TV's to pick up vhfs on rabbit ears. Why can't DVR's, cable and satellite services, and similar programs monitor enough people to at least get a representative sample size? Why is it so hard to actually collect data that Nielson is still using a system that was dated in 1990?

[PeterHilton]

you see, i dont think it does give a good approximation. Too many vairable not included. as for the last 2 paragraphs, i added them to show another type of issue, but after re-reading, i removed them.

 

And....?

 

I think many, many people know it's flawed. I could also point out the studies done that shows the Nielsen scews to an older audience, or to a less diverse audience ethnically.

 

But guess what?

 

It's the system that's in place and established. It's the sytem that advertisers use to determine where to spend their money, which is how networks determine which shows to air and when. Those ratings are THE driving force in how TV executives create their schedules.

 

So even though it's flawed, there's no way around it. Should we stop talking about the ratings? If TNA's Monday show with Hogan did a 0.6, would the people at TNA have been able to dismiss the negative effects by saying "hey, those Nielsen's are garbage!"

 

As far as the TV industry is concered, they are, for the most part, cold hard facts that you MUST deal with.

[sheepy]

Its all about getting a sample which is representative of the demographics of the whole population.

 

Done properly, you can survey a sample of 2000 people and come up to within 0.5% of voting intentions of the whole of the UK population at the next general election.

 

There will be some biases but none they can't work around

[brashleyholland]

Why isn't there? This isn't 1960. We're not using tube TV's to pick up vhfs on rabbit ears. Why can't DVR's, cable and satellite services, and similar programs monitor enough people to at least get a representative sample size? Why is it so hard to actually collect data that Nielson is still using a system that was dated in 1990?

 

Privicy issues. You can't just monitor the data going to and from someones home unless they opt into it. Some people might not be comfortable with random organisations knowing that they're watching adult movies every evening etc. Plus you have the issue of different service providers for different areas etc.

 

Then there is the issue of storage. Who keeps all the data? Is it sold for advertising? You can't do any of that without expressed consent. If you have to go to people and ask for consent, then you may as well be installing a Neilsen box in their house, so it's basically the same situation.

[lazorbeak]

Privicy issues. You can't just monitor the data going to and from someones home unless they opt into it. Some people might not be comfortable with random organisations knowing that they're watching adult movies every evening etc. Plus you have the issue of different service providers for different areas etc.

 

Not. That. Hard. You know who actually reads cable contracts? Nobody. Some people might actually want some sort of monitoring information if they could have access to their family's use. Seriously that's a total non-problem.

[d_w_w]

Its all about getting a sample which is representative of the demographics of the whole population.

 

Done properly, you can survey a sample of 2000 people and come up to within 0.5% of voting intentions of the whole of the UK population at the next general election.

 

There will be some biases but none they can't work around

 

This.

 

It is entirely possible to produce a nationally representative survey of the U.S. with a sample size of under 5,000 (for example, see the General Social Survey - widely considered the best source of data on societal trends and attitudes in the U.S.).

 

The issue, therefore, isn't with the number of households, it's with the bias of the sample (e.g., the studies mentioned by Peter Hilton). I'm inclined to believe that this is a small issue though, as advertisers continue to buy into Nielsen's product and they would be the first to do something about it (if they really thought that the trends and overall rankings were inaccurate).

[d_w_w]

Not. That. Hard. You know who actually reads cable contracts? Nobody. Some people might actually want some sort of monitoring information if they could have access to their family's use. Seriously that's a total non-problem.

 

It's actually a huge problem.

 

If the monitoring was mandatory, it provoke a nasty legal battle. You don't think that various privacy and consumer advocates (including the ACLU) would object to the contracts and have the cable companies in court for the next 10 years?

 

If the monitoring was voluntary, the estimates would likely be far more biased and thus inferior than the numbers pushed out by Nielsen.

[lazorbeak]

It's actually a huge problem.

 

If the monitoring was mandatory, it provoke a nasty legal battle. You don't think that various privacy and consumer advocates (including the ACLU) would object to the contracts and have the cable companies in court for the next 10 years?

 

If the monitoring was voluntary, the estimates would likely be far more biased and thus inferior than the numbers pushed out by Nielsen.

 

It wouldn't be instead of the current system, but in addition to it, and no, it really wouldn't provoke much of a legal battle because it's a contract that the individuals signed. All you'd have to do is have a box that they don't have to sign, and I guarantee you 95% of the population would sign it anyway. So no, as a third year law student taking the bar this year, I don't think the cable companies would be in court for ten years over an optional contract provision that people would be too lazy to read.

[MrOnu]

Hey at least, we moved from relying on people to fill some cards and mail them to the company to know what they are watching. Oh wait, we're still using that for the radio here.

[d_w_w]

It wouldn't be instead of the current system, but in addition to it, and no, it really wouldn't provoke much of a legal battle because it's a contract that the individuals signed. All you'd have to do is have a box that they don't have to sign, and I guarantee you 95% of the population would sign it anyway. So no, as a third year law student taking the bar this year, I don't think the cable companies would be in court for ten years over an optional contract provision that people would be too lazy to read.

 

Note, in my original post, that I mentioned that it would only be a legal battle if it was mandatory. If the monitoring was optional, then I didn't imply any sort of legal battle.

 

More importantly, you're making a wild assumption about the proportion of people that would check the box.

 

Personally, I think you're sort of right - a larger than expected group of people would probably check the box without any second thought. Would it be 95%? I doubt it. This, ultimately, is an empirical issue.

 

And would there be something statistically distinct about the group that does and does not check the box? Almost certainty. And thus, we have bias.

 

But, really, this is a non-issue. If it's in addition to the current system, I have no objections. Your original posts were highly critical of the Nielsen system, thus I assumed that you wanted to replace it.