How are TV ratings measured? Seems like magic to me?
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» Answer from Jim Jones Answer given 145 days 4 hours ago.Selected as Best Answer!
Neilson rates the TV programs by viewer participation. The more viewers watching a program the higher the rating it receives. They know exactly what station you are watching. They can not know how many people are actually sitting and watching but they do know how what TVs are tuned into where. They measure commercial effectiveness in the same way. Prime time is the busiest time for most home TVs to be on which is why only the best programs, the ones having the highest ratings, are shown then. The most expensive commercials are run then as well because they know that the most viewers will be watching during prime time. One day, perhaps, they will be able to see exactly who is watching what as they watch you. It only take a camera installed into the TV to make it happen. We already have the technology to make it happen.
No man is an island indeed- we're not even a peninsula any more; we're all land-locked now.
You're not kidding, Ella!
Actually, they can know who and how many in the monitored households are watching. New equipment includes a switch for each member of the household. Of course, they need to remember to activate it whenever they are watching. I don't know that you can rely 100% on that.
But what did they - whoever they is! - do before the switch was there?
It's still all run by the Nielsen's. It's not a family, but a company. They've kept tabs on what the American people watch for years. In the beginning (and they still do this from time to time) they would call homes at random during primetime and actually ask the people what they were watching. Now there is a "box" that attaches to the TV that let's them find out when the TV is on and what channel it is tuned to. The information is downloaded every night. Ahhh, the wonders of modern technology.
The number of homes that have these boxes is actually quite small and they use the principles of statistic sampling to extrapolate the national numbers. Personally, I think it's all a bunch of whooey. After all, they've never asked me if I'd like to participate. :)
Thanks, Dianne for this. I agree with you, it sounds like a lot of whooey! I can't believe how unsophisticated it is, I thought for sure it would be something to do with satelites and the CIA! I wonder how they measure it here, because we don't have that box thing.
Jim, who is "they" and how exactly do they know - I mean what mechanism is used?
Neilson ratings and occasionally they advertise for reviewers of shows, it involves paperwork as you watch a show over the period of a week, etc. I think their main office is in Florida.
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