Nielsen Now Knows When You Are Streaming (nytimes.com) 57
Nielsen on Thursday announced that it had moved a step closer toward cracking one of the great questions of the modern entertainment world: How big, exactly, is streaming? From a report: Nielsen, the 98-year-old research firm that for decades has had an effective monopoly on measuring TV ratings in the United States, has a new metric that it says allows it to make an apples-to-apples comparison, on a percentage basis, of how many people are streaming shows and films on their TVs versus how many are watching traditional cable and broadcast channels. For the time being, Nielsen reports, people are spending more time watching TV the old-fashioned way -- but streaming is gaining fast.
On Thursday, the firm reported that 64 percent of the time American viewers used their television sets in May 2021 was spent watching network and cable TV, while they watched streaming services about 26 percent of the time. Another 9 percent of the time, they were using their TV screens for things like video games or watching programs or films they had saved on DVR. The streaming share is increasing rapidly. It stood at about 20 percent last year, Nielsen said; in 2019, it was about 14 percent. A Nielsen spokesman said that the firm anticipates the streaming share could go up to about 33 percent by the end of the year. Netflix and YouTube are the streaming leaders, the research firm said, with each capturing 6 percent of total TV time. They are trailed by Hulu (3 percent), Amazon (2 percent) and Disney+ (1 percent). Nielsen calls its new metric The Gauge. It comes in addition to its previous method of measuring how many people are watching streaming platforms, which relies on audio-recognition software included in Nielsen devices that are now in 38,000 households across the country. Both metrics measure only what is viewed on television screens and do not count what is watched on phones or laptops.
On Thursday, the firm reported that 64 percent of the time American viewers used their television sets in May 2021 was spent watching network and cable TV, while they watched streaming services about 26 percent of the time. Another 9 percent of the time, they were using their TV screens for things like video games or watching programs or films they had saved on DVR. The streaming share is increasing rapidly. It stood at about 20 percent last year, Nielsen said; in 2019, it was about 14 percent. A Nielsen spokesman said that the firm anticipates the streaming share could go up to about 33 percent by the end of the year. Netflix and YouTube are the streaming leaders, the research firm said, with each capturing 6 percent of total TV time. They are trailed by Hulu (3 percent), Amazon (2 percent) and Disney+ (1 percent). Nielsen calls its new metric The Gauge. It comes in addition to its previous method of measuring how many people are watching streaming platforms, which relies on audio-recognition software included in Nielsen devices that are now in 38,000 households across the country. Both metrics measure only what is viewed on television screens and do not count what is watched on phones or laptops.
No, they actually don't. (Score:3)
Unless you allow them to spy on you. I wonder how much they pay? If they covered half my internet bill I'd let them do it.
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Yeah, how many TV's are on, and the owner is asleep, or not even in the room?
Re:No, they actually don't. (Score:5, Informative)
My family participated in the tracking for about 6 months. We were paid about $50 per month.
The way it works is you wear a little device clipped to your belt. It listens to what you are hearing and matches the signature to what is being broadcast at that moment by radio, TV stations, cable, etc. It measures what you are hearing, not what is on the TV in a different room.
The device has an accelerometer to tell if it is clipped to someone rather than sitting on a shelf.
Each household member is supposed to wear a device. My kids were terrible at remembering to clip it on each morning, and Nielsen kept yelling at us about it. I clipped my son's device to the dog's collar. But I have two kids and only one dog. Eventually, we got kicked out of the program. To be honest, the hassle wasn't worth the $50.
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Nielsen kept yelling at us about it.
They speakers on these clip things? Sheesh.
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Really? I participated in Australian Nielsen ratings for a couple of years about a decade ago, and it was nothing like that. There was a device that attached to the (CRT) TV with a transducer that could pick up the H/V sync, and match it with a broadcast. You told it who was watching with a special remote control with dedicated buttons for household members, and a way to enter demographic information for guests. It was a bit of a culture shock for our son when our participation in the program ended, bec
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Since all connected TVs now implement spyware that sells your viewing data (in fact a couple of vendors have outright come out and said they couldn't make a profit selling TVs unless they had that revenue stream), the relevance of the Nielsen nu
Re: No, they actually don't. (Score:1)
Are you really that gullible or just stupid
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I was part of the US Nielsen ratings about ten years ago, and all we had were boxes that connected to the audio out of all of our A/V devices. Apparently there is a audio code in each program that explains what it is.
We didn't have a special remote that told Nielsen who was watching what, either. We got paid by the device they monitored, and got about $40 a month total. They also warranted any device that they needed to tap into for monitoring.
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When did they start doing this? That's so invasive! :(
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When did they start doing this? That's so invasive! :(
Nielsen has been tracking consumer consumption of media since the 1930s.
It is opt-in, so it is not "invasive".
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I noticed a while back that the Hulu app on my Roku allowed toggling the Nielson tracking off (it opted in by default).
What's weird is that about a week after toggling it off, I got a Nielson paper survey in the mail that offered me $10 to fill it out and send it back. Strange coincidence? Maybe....
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What if you're not wearing a belt?
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I spend a lot of time in the same room with the TV on somehow not even hearing it. I just turn on the news when I wake up and a lot of the time I'm listening to something else on my headphones. It's how I stay "informed" (not really). Every once in a while I'll actually watch the news, but when they say a lot of the same things over and over all day long I don't have to watch much.
But even when I don't have headphones on I can usually focus my attention away from the TV.
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Everything is cost + taxes + your margin = price
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Re:No, they actually don't. (Score:5, Interesting)
Nielsen doesn't actually want to know about your streaming. All the questions they ask assume that you're still watching network TV or cable TV.
Even when they ask you about what are your favorite television genres, in the fine print, they tell you not to include any of the genres that you stream. And I can guarantee you that most people are going to ignore that fine print and still mention their favorite TV genre, the way this question was phrased, even if they've stopped watching regular TV or cable TV entirely.
It's like their survey is specially designed to inflate the figures of people still watching network TV and cable TV.
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It's like their survey is specially designed to inflate the figures of people still watching network TV and cable TV.
That's the whole point. Nielsen only exists because network/cable TV are still paying them, desperately trying to hold on to relevance.
Re: No, they actually don't. (Score:2)
If most of their participants still watch linear tv, then they're probably mostly old people.
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According to the article, it definitely does involve people allowing Nielsen spy on them.
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Bro you need to try new Nielsen+.
For only $29.99/mo, you can have full metrics on what you watch on TV!
And with NielsenPro, they can monitor your internet behavior for only $59.99!
Both combined, Nielsen Ultimate+ is only $199.99 a month! Zuckerberg approved!
More importantly (Score:4, Funny)
Do they know when I'm sleeping? How about when I'm awake? Do they know when I've been good or bad, so maybe I'll be good for goodness sake? I'd better watch out...
Re: More importantly (Score:4, Funny)
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Targeted advertising is coming to town?
Perhaps an impressive name to the Mickey Marketeers, but this is like "targeted spam."
I can ignore the shit out of that too.
They don't know shit (Score:4, Informative)
Re:They don't know shit (Score:5, Funny)
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The end points (the servers, and the client) know what is occuring. At any point they (the streaming application, or streaming server) can inform the company what you're watching.
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It doesn't work like that. They give selected households a device that listens to the TV and matches it up with what channel they are watching. Kinda like Shazam for music.
They must somehow have improved it to handle streaming.
mod parent up (Score:2)
I have relatives who are signed up. The smart device is a wifi microphone which detects audio fingerprints so they know what you are listening to. If you don't wear the device they call you by phone to remind you to wear the device - and they know if you are wearing it or not.
It is creepy having an internet microphone connected to them all the time. Whenever I'm visiting I feel like I'm being recorded. They claim they don't actually listen and instead the fingerprints are streamed to them.
I keep wonderi
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When I want to watch a show I ensure my VPN is running, then download it Then I watch it.
Unless they can track what I watch, as opposed to what I download, they have no clue.
An earlier post said that they use a device that listens and matches up the audio signal of whatever you're watching to their database. So as long as whatever you're downloading is in their audio signature database, they can track it.
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I wonder what they know about (Score:3)
my NAS and all the movies and tv shows I've ripped or downloaded?
Sometimes it's easier to just download something than search through the shelves and toss into a blu-ray or dvd player.
Smart TVs report this data (Score:4, Informative)
Smart TV's (Score:1)
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Yep. Have 2 big smart TV's only used for streaming and computer use, nothing else. The DVB-T's in these units isn't used at all. Bad quality, low resolutions makes streaming the way to go.
And yes, they do record everything short of your HDMI input (guess that's coming at some point too).
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So what? The ratings system is fucked up. (Score:2)
Even if you live in a household where they are monitoring what you view for ratings purposes, if you don't happen to be in the "popular" demographic, your interests aren't going to count worth jack..
This is going to make precisely zero difference as to what types of programming are likely to be made in the future.
Twitch (Score:2)
Twitch automatically announces when you're streaming, why are they proud of figuring this out? Do they need help opening a PDF too?
"Effective" ignorance. (Score:2, Funny)
"Nielsen, the 98-year-old research firm that for decades has had an effective monopoly on measuring TV ratings..."
Oh, so it's not an actual monopoly identified after decades? Just an "effective" one? This is how we blatantly ignore anti-monopoly laws?
This is like labeling Pablo Escobar a "suspected" drug dealer.
Sure would have been nice if perhaps anyone else came along and provided some competition. I hope the streaming services, break them.
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Streaming? (Score:4, Funny)
It's more of a dribble at my age.
Could Nielsen please shake it for me when I'm done?
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Nielson / Roku Partnership (Score:3)
Nielson has this data now because then entered into a partnership with Roku [deadline.com].
With Roku's OS powering a large number of smart TV's across North America -- 38 percent market share in the U.S. and 31 percent in Canada at the end of 2020 [roku.com] -- they have a wealth of data.
If you include those who use Roku streaming devices, that's over 51.2 million active accounts Roku and Nielson are pulling viewer data from.
Bad report (Score:1)
They don't ... (Score:2)
...they take a very small sample of households willing to be monitored - this just adds streaming to the list of things they monitor in those households
It has long been known that Neilsons ratings are wildly unrepresentative... but nobody can think of any way of doing this better
wrong title (Score:1)
The title claims Nielsen knows when I'm streaming.
Well, at best they know the behaviors of s set of people and extrapolate it to the whole market.
So no, they don't know anything about ME.
And no, this is not a poetic license, but a false claim.
Coming to town (Score:2)
You better watch out
You better not cry
You better not pout
I'm telling you why
Nielsen is coming to town.
He's making a list,
He's checking it twice,
He's gonna find out who's naughty or nice
Nielsen is coming to town.
He sees you when you're sleeping
And he knows when you're awake
He knows if you've been bad or good
So be good for goodness sake.
Nielsen Claws are coming to town! (Score:2)
They know when you are streaming
They know when you're awake
They know when you stream bad or good
So stream good for goodness sake