"The ratings system is the most bogus thing in this country," TNT's Charles Barkley says between bites of a sandwich. "It's like the BCS. I've been living for 44 years and I have never met a person with a Nielsen box. Never. And when you are black and you have money, you get a lot of people coming around you."Ever wonder how television ratings work? You might be surprised to learn how small the sample size is - the so-called "Nielsen box", which records and transmits your TV viewing to produce ratings information, is only attached to 5,000 televisions in the country. Although I'm younger than Barkley, I too have never met or even heard of anyone with a Nielsen box.
Television ratings matter, especially to me. My favorite shows invariably seem to be teetering on the brink of cancellation, from "NewsRadio" to "30 Rock". It's of little consolation to me to hear people say things like, "I got 'Arrested Development' on DVD - I love this show, I wish it didn't get cancelled". I'm tempted to snarl back, "maybe if you watched it while it was on, it would still be around."
But of course, that doesn't make any sense. (Which is why I don't say it). If you don't have a Nielsen box, and don't fill out Nielsen surveys, you could watch all my favorite shows religiously and it wouldn't make any difference. I continue to tell everyone I know that they have to watch "Friday Night Lights", only even if I got everyone I ever met to watch it, the ratings literally would not move an inch.Supposedly Nielsen regularly changes the 5,000 TV sample set, and measures the discrepancy between samplings to assess if they are getting an accurate cross-section of American TV viewing. Without getting into the statistics of it, I will just say that I have my doubts on the reliability of a 5,000 TV sample meant to represent 100 million TV sets. John McEnroe once had a talk show that received a 0.0 rating. Which would imply that no one in the whole country, even McEnroe himself, bothered to tune into the show. As lousy as I'm sure the show was, that can't possibly have been the case.
My buddy Rob did get solicited to be a Nielsen survey user when we were much younger. He didn't have a box, but he was supposed to write down what he watched in a journal and send it back. I think he actually did, because otherwise it's hard to believe FOX would keep airing "Sliders".
Just know that if I ever manage to become part of the Nielsen sample, I will revolutionize television. If anyone out there knows how I can become part of the sample, please let me know. Let's make this happen.
7 comments:
Eric,
If ratings are important to you, check out our site, http://tvbythenumbers.com.
We're all about ratings and analysis of the television business.
Cheers, Bill G
Appreciate the link, the site is very good, but I don't really need to know the ratings. I just need to influence them somehow, which is, of course, impossible.
The media/advertising industry need to reevaluate their model. In this day and age of TiVo, iTunes, free streaming and downloading sites on the Internet, and DVD boxsets, who really plans their lives around sitting in front of the tube to catch their favorite shows at times dictated by the broadcasting stations?
Instead of trying to manipulate the ratings system, you need to overthrow the system.
the revolution will not be televised
oops.
anyways,
1. youve made it beyond people you know which is an accomplishment. kudos, mr ma.
2. you have an od on the side for an nbc online only drama called coastal dreams. the girl in the ad looks eerily similar to a friend of mine from college. altho she was an art major and not an actress. but thats not the point. nbc is going with online only shows now? i feel bad for anyone that is part of that show. you get approached by an nbc show, thinking "wow, this is really something!" only to find out that its not actually on the peacock network, but only on their website. so sad.
3. on one hand, id really like to be influential in the nielsen ratings, however, if people like me did have boxes, networks would start all trying to replicate the CW. I feel like people like you would then get really mad at me. haha. altho friday night lights would be pretty safe, as i have also been trying to get new viewers.
i did write about what tv shows would make my network, maybe a nielsen box is a more realistic way for me to influence tv than to actually own my own network. maybe. maybe...
4. anonymous is correct, but thats never going to happen. old school ways of research like the nielsen ratings are going to stick around because people fear change. nobody who make any influential decisions is going to take the risk, because while some changes could greatly improve the tv industry, in this case, the fear of failure will almost certainly prevent such changes from ever taking place.
5. #4 isnt "me" enough to end my comment. so here is #5. purely here to waste space. thats my style!
"overthrow the system"
"You know who uses that phrase? People who don't have the guts or brains to work inside the system -- letter-writers, radicals, Howard Dean." - Jack Donaghy, 30 Rock
A total system overthrow would be good, but I agree with Vish, I don't see how it's possible.
And the revolution is being televised. It's called "A Shot at Love with Tila Tequila". Revolutionary.
Is it really only 5000?
I have a pretty close friend that got hooked up with Nielsen half a year ago. He's unemployed now so I'm sure you could pay him to turn the channel to certain shows.
I remember him saying his TV counts for 75000 TVs, so I guess it is only 5000. That is lame.
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