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A people meter is an audience measurement tool used to measure the viewing habits of TV and cable audiences.
The People Meter is a 'box', about the size of a paperback book. The box is hooked up to each television set and is accompanied by a remote control unit. Each family member in a sample household is assigned a personal 'viewing button'. It identifies each household member's age and sex. If the TV is turned on and the viewer doesn't identify themselves, the meter flashes to remind them. Additional buttons on the People Meter enable guests to participate in the sample by recording their age, sex and viewing status into the system.
Another version of the device is small, about the size of a beeper, that plugs into the wall below or near each TV set in household. It monitors anything that comes on the TV and relays the information with the small Portable People Meter to narrow down who is watching what and when.
The device, known as a 'frequency-based meter', was invented by a British company called Audits of Great Britain (AGB). The successor company to AGB is TNS, which is active in 34 countries around the globe.
Originally, these meters identified the frequency of the channels - VHF or UHF - watched on the viewer's TV set. This system became obsolete when Direct to Home (DTH) satellite dish became popular and viewers started to get their own satellite decoders. In addition, this system doesn't measure digital broadcasts.
Before the People Meter advances, Nielsen used the diary method, which consisted of viewers physically recording the shows they watched. However, there were setbacks with the system. Lower-rated stations claimed the diary method was inaccurate and biased. They argued that because they had lower ratings, those who depended on memory for the diary method may only remember to track their favorite shows. Stations also argued that if it wasn't low ratings that skewed the diary method, it might also be the new variety of channels for viewers to choose from. Viewers may not be able to record everything they watch and there is no way of discovering the truth. Finally in 1986, Nielsen developed an electronic meter, People Meter, to solve the problem. The People Meter is an electronic method of television measurement that moved from active and diary-based to passive and meter-monitored. The meter also recorded real time simultaneously viewing, reducing memory bias.
Because Audits of Great Britain (AGB) had just entered the U.S. market executing similar technology, Nielsen felt the need to compete. Nielsen made a substantial technological advance before network-era norms entered crisis with transition to the national People Meter sample in 1987. Although People Meters presented substantial improvements over the previous system, the alteration in audience measurement caused significant controversy. The method change costs stations whose audience had been overestimated. The networks firmly disagreed; they pointed out that certain demographics such as young children could not operate the people meter accurately, thus underestimating the number of children watching a particular program. [1] The end of the multi-channel transition was in large part due to the continuous changes in technology and distribution. Nielsen was at a disadvantage as their measuring techniques required burdensome adjustments. Luckily for Nielsen, the advances in advertising strategies, distribution windows, and ways people were using television made industry sectors interested in data about viewing behavior.
Along with changing their counting methods, Nielsen also started emphasizing their sample in 2003 in reaction to census shifts and requests from some industry sectors. Nielsen's automated Local People Meter (LPM) technology was introduced in New York and Los Angeles. The LPM improved the method of measurement from active and diary-based to passive and meter-monitored. More importantly, the LPM provides accurate measurements to particular local markets, verse a nationwide sample from the People meter. While diary-based surveys concentrated on quarterly “sweeps” periods, the industry has been pushed towards year-round measurement, due to the automated LPM system.
"Nielsen introduced the LPM as evidence of the rupturing of the network-era business model became broadly apparent, and apprehension about the future of the industry erupted on all sectors. LPM’s more accurately reported full range of what programming viewers watched, including what was observed when channel surfing, in comparison to the diary method it replaced. It allowed Nielsen to maintain established measurement practices, but do them better”. [2]
“While Nielsen’s LPM’s presented next-day demographic analyses on television viewership in major cities, the devices led to accusations of undercounting minorities. A lot of controversy surrounding LPM’s was driven by News Corporation-funded “Don’t Count Us Out” alliance, which exploited activists’ and legislators’ foreseeable mindless reactions to any suggestion of racism” (Lowry, 2004).
Today there are new systems such as the Portable People Meter and 'Picture Matching' measuring the viewing habits of TV audiences. In an effort to improve the accuracy of radio ratings, Arbitron and Nielsen Media Research are testing a "portable people meter" (PPM) for radio. This new device to be clipped to an individual's clothing. Radio stations encode an inaudible, unique signal as part of their broadcasts. The PPM "hears" this signal and records the station and the time spent listening. Such a device requires far less effort on the part of respondents.
Nielsen Audio is a consumer research company in the United States that collects listener data on radio broadcasting audiences. It was founded as the American Research Bureau by Jim Seiler in 1949 and became national by merging with Los Angeles–based Coffin, Cooper, and Clay in the early 1950s. The company's initial business was the collection of broadcast television ratings.
Barb Audiences Ltd is a British organisation that compiles audience measurement and television ratings in the United Kingdom. It was created in 1981 to replace two previous systems whereby ITV ratings were compiled by JICTAR, whilst the BBC did their own audience research.
The television industry in India is very diverse and produces thousands of programs in many Indian languages. More than half of all Indian households own a television. As of 2016, the country had over 900 channels of which 184 were pay channels. National channels operate in Hindi and English, in addition to channels in several other languages including Telugu, Tamil, Kannada, Malayalam, Bengali, Marathi, Odia, Punjabi, Assamese, Gujarati, Urdu, Bhojpuri, Kashmiri, Konkani and Haryanvi, among others. The Hindi, Telugu and Tamil language television industries are by far the largest television industries in India.
Nielsen Holdings plc is an American information, data and market measurement firm. Nielsen operates in over 100 countries and employs approximately 44,000 people worldwide.
Audience measurement calculates how many people are in an audience, usually in relation to radio listenership and television viewership, but also in relation to newspaper and magazine readership and, increasingly, web traffic. The term is sometimes used with regard to practices that help broadcasters and advertisers determine who is listening, rather than how many people are listening. In some parts of the world, the resulting numbers are referred to as audience share; in other places, the broader term market share is used. This broader meaning is also known as audience research. Measurements are broken down by media market, which corresponds to large and small metropolitan areas.
Television ratings in Australia are used to determine the size and composition of audiences across Australian broadcast and subscription television, primarily for the purpose of informing advertisers what programming is popular with the audience they are attempting to sell their product or service to.
OzTAM is an Australian audience measurement research firm that collects and markets television ratings data. It is jointly owned by the Seven Network, the Nine Network and Network Ten, and is the official source of television ratings data for all metropolitan television in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth as well as subscription services on a national basis.
Numeris is a Canadian audience measurement organization. Established on May 11, 1944 as a division of the Canadian Association of Broadcasters, Numeris is the sole provider of viewership numbers for television and radio broadcasters in Canada.
The Portable People Meter (PPM), also known as the Nielsen Meter, was a system developed by Arbitron to measure how many people are exposed to individual radio stations and television stations. This also includes cable television. The PPM is worn like a pager and detects hidden audio tones within a station or network's audio stream, logging each time it finds a signal.
The Audience Appreciation Index (AI) is an indicator measured from 0 to 100 of the public's appreciation for a television or radio programme, or broadcast service, in the United Kingdom.
Médiamétrie, established in 1985, is a public limited company specialising in audience measurement and research into audio-visual and digital media usage in France. It is especially well known for its Audimat brand whose name is now part of everyday language; today, however, that brand is named Médiamat.
AGB Nielsen Media Research Philippines, commonly called AGB Nielsen, under The Nielsen Company is a global leader in audience measurement, market research firms, and data analytics, with a focus on media in the Philippines. Nielsen conducts audience measurements for television ratings in specific areas of the Philippines, particularly in national urban and rural areas.
Nielsen Media Research (NMR) is an American firm that measures media audiences, including television, radio, theatre, films, and newspapers. Headquartered in New York City, it is best known for the Nielsen ratings, an audience measurement system of television viewership that for years has been the deciding factor in canceling or renewing television shows by television networks. As of May 2012, it is part of Nielsen Holdings.
Single-source data is the measurement of TV and/or other mass media's advertising exposure and purchase behavior, over time for the same individual or household. This measurement is gauged through the collection of data components supplied by one or more parties overlapped through a single integrated system of data collection matched to the person or household level. How these data are stored is known as a single-source database.
According to Amanda D. Lotz, the multi-channel transition began in the mid-1980s and ended in the late 1990s. During this era, multichannel television became popular in the United States, leading to the breakdown of the network era which had been dominated by the Big Three broadcast networks. Many changes happened during this transition, such as the invention of the remote control, the video cassette player, and analog cable systems expanding viewers' choice and control. This era gave viewers more choice and control over what and when they wanted to view a program. Viewers were able to defy the networks' schedules, because they could record the program and watch it whenever they wanted, using the VCR and later the DVR. Producers adjusted to the government regulations and networks were forced to give up some of the control they had over program creation. Subscription channels emerged with no advertisements and the method for measuring audiences grew with the Nielsen People Meter. The multi-channel transition was followed by the post-network era and Second Golden Age of Television.
The post-network era, also known as the post-broadcast era, is a concept in U.S. television that was popularized by Amanda D. Lotz. It denotes the period that followed an earlier network era, the nation's first institutional phase that started in the 1950s and ran through to the mid-1980s, and television's later multi-channel transition. It describes a period that saw the deterioration of the dominance of the Big Three television networks: ABC, CBS and NBC in the United States, and follows the creation of a wide variety of cable television channels that catered specifically to niche groups. The post-network era saw the development of networks that deliver a wider diversity of programming choice, less constraints on a consumers choice of medium, decentralization of the location of viewing, and freedom of choice over time of viewing. It is concurrent with the Second Golden Age of Television.
A second screen involves the use of a computing device to provide a different viewing experience for content on another device.
The Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC) India is a joint industry body founded by organisations that represent Indian broadcasters (IBDF), advertisers (ISA), and advertising and media agencies (AAAI). It is the world's largest television measurement science industry body.
Average minute audience (AMA) is a type of measurement that directly reflects the television audience size. It is calculated by averaging the number of viewers for each minute of programming throughout the event. It is commonly used by broadcasters, advertisers, and researchers to evaluate the performance and popularity of TV content.