Comments on: Nielsen starts counting TiVo viewers

By: megazone

megazone — Thu, 19 Oct 2006 21:07:59 +0000

I’m not sure, I vaguely remember 10,000 at one point but that could be my faulty memory.

By: mryn

mryn — Thu, 19 Oct 2006 16:13:05 +0000

Do we know how many active TiVo/Nielsen households exist?

By: megazone

megazone — Wed, 18 Oct 2006 19:59:04 +0000

No, you have to be one of the invited households. Nielsen picks who they want and invites them, otherwise they could get games by fans of a specific show opting in, etc.

By: excaliburca

excaliburca — Wed, 18 Oct 2006 19:15:37 +0000

Out of curiousity, is there any way you could opt in as as Nielsen family as the TiVo has the ability to transmit the data anyway?

By: megazone

megazone — Wed, 18 Oct 2006 06:05:39 +0000

TiVo and Nielsen have had an agreement for quite a while now. The first phase was an opt-in program where random TiVo owners were asked if they were willing to be Nielsen families. Instead of getting a Nielsen box the TiVo is used to gather viewing data. I believe it has expanded a bit since then to use more of TiVo’s data.

By: anonymous

anonymous — Wed, 18 Oct 2006 05:56:51 +0000

I’m not sure that this is accurate. I was under the impression that TiVo and Neilsen did not have an agreement and were competing for data services. From what I understand there is controversy surrounding how Neilsen is calculating the ratings whereas TiVo provides second by second aggregate analysis. I could be wrong, but I think this may be a case where DVR is being confused as a TiVo and we all know that there is a big difference.

Davis

By: amedia

amedia — Wed, 18 Oct 2006 03:14:09 +0000

Yay! You know, *ages* ago, when TiVo first revealed that it was reporting more info than it said it was, a lot of folks were mad about the invasion of privacy, but I was happy – it was like being a Nielsen family! Finally, the nerds have a voice!