Nielsen's 2010 U.S. Audiences and Device Report

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The information and graphs in this report are fairly interesting but you can't help but wonder how they get these numbers. I mean, can you really survey a couple thousand people and then extrapolate those numbers into stats for the entire U.S.?
 
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I have a VCR. It's not hooked up to anything, but it's there. I was actually amazed when I went into the grocery store last week and they have a display of VHS movies they are selling on closeout.
 
BoogerBomb said:
70 million people still have VCR's?
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....that's what I'm saying :)


According to the census, there are just under 130M households in this country and they are claiming 70M have a VCR?

Seriously, when is the last time you SAW a VCR in someone's home?
 
Steve said:
I mean, can you really survey a couple thousand people and then extrapolate those numbers into stats for the entire U.S.?
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Well, thats exactly what Neilson does. They don't do a random sampling, but rather a targetted sampling of specific demographs. IIRC, it has in the few thousands. There's already a big stink over Neilson over the way they do TV ratings being archaic for this day and age.
 
It partly is people not throwing things out either I would think. For instance I have VCR still (I'm not in the US though), I'm not even sure if it still works properly and I haven't actually used it for watching any tapes for years and years. I've had it hooked up though for the longest time because it always made my TV reception much clearer, I'm guessing because it is an older unit made out of metal and is acting as a receiver or something lol...
 
This is always the problem with these things. they sample a small group and then try to claim that fits everyone. That is fine for science when you can tell that your test group actually is a valid sample. ie if you grow a culture on a dish, you can look at the entire dish and know that if you count 1/6 of the growths and multiple by 6 if that should be a valid guess or if the growths are only covering 1/3 of the dish and your 1/6th sample isn't a valid area. or something like that. but trying to randomly pick a few hundred people or even a thousand or two and expect the results of those few to apply to the entire population is not going to be valid for stuff like that.
 
I'll tell you how they do it, as my family and I were one of the homes that Nielsen used to collect data.

My experience took place around 2005.

It all starts with some guy who chooses a neighborhood and walks up to your door and without a "true" introduction asks you some basic questions as to "how many people live in your house, what are the age groups of the people in the household, how many TV's do you own, etc." After you pass the initial test of whether or not your home meets the criteria they are searching for he then introduces himself as a Nielsen employee and he comes inside and you have a extensive sit-down conversation with him.

If you agree to allow them to use your house, you setup a date where it seems like an army of Nielsen employees come and setup shop in your house. They literally connect little boxes to any device you use for media consumption, run wires all across your attic connecting each device that then connects to some sort of modem or something if I remember correctly. At 3am each morning it transmits data back to HQ I guess and they get their data.

There are few perks such as if any device breaks during the period where the collect data from you they will either fix or replace free of charge. (This was a major plus to my family as we had 2 TV's that needed replacing a they stepped up the plate and gave us one new one and fixed the other!)...The other perk being was it's kind of a neat little tidbit you can spout off anytime this sort of convo takes place....of course you're sworn to secrecy and you can't tell anyone that your house is used to collect data for their ratings system.

I always ask myself the question if the opportunity presented itself would I do it again? I always reply with a resounding NO. IMO it's not worth the hassle and I would never allow them near my super expensive HDTVs.
 
rusty12 said:
I'll tell you how they do it, as my family and I were one of the homes that Nielsen used to collect data.

My experience took place around 2005.

It all starts with some guy who chooses a neighborhood and walks up to your door and without a "true" introduction asks you some basic questions as to "how many people live in your house, what are the age groups of the people in the household, how many TV's do you own, etc." After you pass the initial test of whether or not your home meets the criteria they are searching for he then introduces himself as a Nielsen employee and he comes inside and you have a extensive sit-down conversation with him.

If you agree to allow them to use your house, you setup a date where it seems like an army of Nielsen employees come and setup shop in your house. They literally connect little boxes to any device you use for media consumption, run wires all across your attic connecting each device that then connects to some sort of modem or something if I remember correctly. At 3am each morning it transmits data back to HQ I guess and they get their data.

There are few perks such as if any device breaks during the period where the collect data from you they will either fix or replace free of charge. (This was a major plus to my family as we had 2 TV's that needed replacing a they stepped up the plate and gave us one new one and fixed the other!)...The other perk being was it's kind of a neat little tidbit you can spout off anytime this sort of convo takes place....of course you're sworn to secrecy and you can't tell anyone that your house is used to collect data for their ratings system.

I always ask myself the question if the opportunity presented itself would I do it again? I always reply with a resounding NO. IMO it's not worth the hassle and I would never allow them near my super expensive HDTVs.
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And that there shows that they are basis and that their info is meaningless.
 
Exavior said:
This is always the problem with these things. they sample a small group and then try to claim that fits everyone. That is fine for science when you can tell that your test group actually is a valid sample. ie if you grow a culture on a dish, you can look at the entire dish and know that if you count 1/6 of the growths and multiple by 6 if that should be a valid guess or if the growths are only covering 1/3 of the dish and your 1/6th sample isn't a valid area. or something like that. but trying to randomly pick a few hundred people or even a thousand or two and expect the results of those few to apply to the entire population is not going to be valid for stuff like that.
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Yes it is.

Take a statistics class.

The only issue is making sure you take proper allowance for the "kind" of people that don't respond to surveys.
 
I still have a VCR :)

I find it hard to believe 83million people use the web on their phone. That must be how many have the ability to use it, but I don't see that many actually using it.
 
Two interesting things...

76 million VCR's ? I thought they were all in landfill's by now.

And I noticed BluRay didn't even make the list.
 
arentol said:
Yes it is.

Take a statistics class.

The only issue is making sure you take proper allowance for the "kind" of people that don't respond to surveys.
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What we learned in school is that there are so many variables that will adversely impact any survey, the best you can do is gather your data, present your findings and fully disclose your methods.

Claiming data represents all U.S. households is retarded.

Conduct a survey during the day? You miss the night people.
Conduct a survey in the south? You miss the people in the north.
Conduct a survey over the phone? You miss the people that avoid calls / use cell phones.
Conduct a survey door to door? You miss the people that don't open the door.
Conduct a survey during the week? You miss people that work.
Conduct a survey over the weekend? You missed the church going folks.
Conduct a survey in a heavily democratic are? You miss the republicans.
Conduct a survey rich neighborhood? You miss the poor.

THEN there are the people that don't answer truthfully (for a number of reasons)

Etc. etc. etc. so on and so forth.
 
arentol said:
Yes it is.

Take a statistics class.

The only issue is making sure you take proper allowance for the "kind" of people that don't respond to surveys.
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I took statistics class. you determine your sample size from a forumula and then "assume" that your picking a valid group of people that are a perfect sample. Problem is how do you know that you are picking from a valid range, and in this case it has been posted above that Nielsen only gets info from people that meet a certain condition that they want to begin with so they do NOT take any proper allowance for the rest of the people.
 
I'm pretty sure there was an [H] news item about different regions of the US being very different technologically. I think maybe the southwest was really heavy on VCR's still.
 
I used to get Nielsen web surveys, through one of those surveys for cash companies I had blast filling out what ever I felt like.
 
Steve said:
What we learned in school is that there are so many variables that will adversely impact any survey, the best you can do is gather your data, present your findings and fully disclose your methods.

Claiming data represents all U.S. households is retarded.

Conduct a survey during the day? You miss the night people.
Conduct a survey in the south? You miss the people in the north.
Conduct a survey over the phone? You miss the people that avoid calls / use cell phones.
Conduct a survey door to door? You miss the people that don't open the door.
Conduct a survey during the week? You miss people that work.
Conduct a survey over the weekend? You missed the church going folks.
Conduct a survey in a heavily democratic are? You miss the republicans.
Conduct a survey rich neighborhood? You miss the poor.

THEN there are the people that don't answer truthfully (for a number of reasons)

Etc. etc. etc. so on and so forth.
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OH MY GOD. OMG, OH MY GOD, you are SOOOOOO RIGHT. LORDY LORDY, we gotta call up the President of Nielsen right now and let him know all these things that you just were the first person in the history of the world to think of. How can people who have dedicated their lives and built their methodology on the data, experience, and mistakes of those who came before them not have considered all these things? OH THE HUMANITY!!!!!

Do you seriously think they don't have statistical models and data gathering processes to minimize the impact of all these concerns? Seriously? With the trillions of dollars of advertising money resting on these things you think they are too stupid to make the results reasonable accurate? Really?

I am not saying they are 100% right, but neither are they. They disclose the expected accuracy of these kinds of reports, which I think would be around 4% margin for this size of survey. There are calculations for determining these things, and the way it works would surprise you. For instance, if 2500 people calculates out to a 4% margin of error then chances are 2000 people might be a 7% margin, 1500 people 18%, and 1000 people would be entirely useless. Meanwhile going the other way, the move from 2500 people to 25000 would only get you from 4% margin of error to 3%, making it a complete waste of time and resources to do that big of a survey. Going up to 25,000,000 would STILL be off by over a full percent and would cost tens of millions to do right. This is why 2500 people is enough, because more don't add much for the cost and less is not accurate enough to be useful.
 
I have a VCR sitting somewhere in my back closet... hasnt been used in about 7 years now. I still have original Matrix on a video tape :eek:
 
I haven't had a VCR since I lived with my parents in ~1998, and even then that thing never saw any use.

Two things I want to comment on:

- Approximately 730 text messages per month is the U.S. average.

Jesus. I usually don't even get close to my 200 plan limit in a month!

- Average TV watching in the U.S. is 35.6 hours per week.

Holy fucking christ! That's almost a full time job. What is wrong with these losers.

Most weeks I watch about 2 hours of TV per week. Essentially I watch Monday through Thursdays Daily show, the day after DVR'ed and fast forward through the ads, so it's only a half an hour or so long.

I occasionally watch something else (I did enjoy the Walking Dead this season) but that I don't think really brings up my 2hr/week average, as it seems like Jon Stewart is on vacation all the time, so over a year it averages out.

"Reality" TV shows just need to die.
 
I haven't had a VCR since I lived with my parents in ~1998, and even then that thing never saw any use.

Two things I want to comment on:

- Approximately 730 text messages per month is the U.S. average.

Jesus. I usually don't even get close to my 200 plan limit in a month!

- Average TV watching in the U.S. is 35.6 hours per week.

Holy fucking christ! That's almost a full time job. What is wrong with these losers.

Most weeks I watch about 2 hours of TV per week. Essentially I watch Monday through Thursdays Daily show, the day after DVR'ed and fast forward through the ads, so it's only a half an hour or so long.

I occasionally watch something else (I did enjoy the Walking Dead this season) but that I don't think really brings up my 2hr/week average, as it seems like Jon Stewart is on vacation all the time, so over a year it averages out.

"Reality" TV shows just need to die.
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FTW.

You sir, are the kind of "un"-American that will be the death of this country, because YOU sir are failing in your duty as a Patriotic, God-fearing, Amurrican to mindlessly consume everything and anything laid at your feet by Corporate Marketing and clearly the root cause of this is your lack of TV consumption!

How can we have a consumer based economy if such as you don't do your part?

Full disclosure: A family of three, 2 adults, married, one 13 yr old son. Media outlets: one SD TV with digital adapter for OTA, no cable, no satellite, no DVR, no netflix. One cellphone w/o texting (wife's), DSL..and everyone has at least one computer. No blackberry, no iPad, no iTouch, no iPhone, no Android. The house is a calm oasis in a sea of self induced turbidity.
:cool:
 
Leave it to Hforum to take a perfectly interesting article and then turn it into a Statistical Theory 101 discussion. I love you guys. :)
 
yes, yes you can.

About 400 years of statistical analysis, research methods, and calculus support the precept that you can sample a dataset of certain size and extrapolate the given angle and trend of a curve.

Otherwise calculus wouldn't work, planes wouldn't fly, medicine would kill everyone who took it, and chemicals would be so toxic they'd scorch the earth.

Not to mention spaceships would have never left the planet, planets would be crashing into each other on a regular basis, and we might as well throw out the concept of gravity while we're at it as well.

Science is the prevent lens for looking at our world, because everything that came before it is a stepping stone toward a greater understanding of our universe.

There's a frightening trend of disregarding science in favor of religion, or random gibberish, or worse. As someone who's spent years depending on gravity to keep myself from flying off the planet and out into the cold vacuum of space, i hope they're not right. I sort of like it here, however if there wrong; they're doing a great job of erasing 100's years worth of scientific discovery, progress, and education.

I don't see that as a good thing, my apologies if this came off a bit harsh. One of the understandings you come to once you've taken a LOT of math and science is that it's all interacted. There isn't just calculus and geometry, engineering and physics, computers and cars. Everything is highly interconnected. If you starting doubting the pieces you don't like, you might as well be doubting all of it.
 
arentol said:
OH MY GOD. OMG, OH MY GOD, you are SOOOOOO RIGHT. LORDY LORD...<snip>.
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Holy cow. Are you alright? Damn bro, don't blow a blood vessel. :eek:

I am saying Neilsen is a company that sells stats.
I am stating fact that polls are inherently flawed for the reasons mentioned in my post.
If extrapolating the results of telephone surveys and exit polls worked, we'd be able to predict elections accurately (rarely happenes).
Extrapolating the results of a telephone survey of 2,000 people into "Of all U.S. households..." invites idiots like me to make fun of those survey results.

That's all.

Not sure how that warranted your freak out above.
 
Steve said:
Holy cow. Are you alright? Damn bro, don't blow a blood vessel. :eek:

I am saying Neilsen is a company that sells stats.
I am stating fact that polls are inherently flawed for the reasons mentioned in my post.
If extrapolating the results of telephone surveys and exit polls worked, we'd be able to predict elections accurately (rarely happenes).
Extrapolating the results of a telephone survey of 2,000 people into "Of all U.S. households..." invites idiots like me to make fun of those survey results.

That's all.

Not sure how that warranted your freak out above.
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Probably works for Neilsen and is pissed that a few of us know that they have shit for results.
 
Holy crap, the average person watches 35 hours of TV a week? Seriously? Who has 35 hours a week to burn watching TV?
 
RazorWind said:
Holy crap, the average person watches 35 hours of TV a week? Seriously? Who has 35 hours a week to burn watching TV?
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All of sue broke ass fucks that cant afford to do anything or dont want to because everything you do in life costs a fucking fortune.
 
RazorWind said:
Holy crap, the average person watches 35 hours of TV a week? Seriously? Who has 35 hours a week to burn watching TV?
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That is only an average of 5 hours a day. A better question is why would it be hard for somebody to have 5 free hours a day? Not saying that you should be sitting there that many hours, but having 35 hours a week to burn on tv or anything else shouldn't be a problem.

Although i'm way past 35 hours a week if i take tv & movies. I normally have a tv show or movie on 6.5 - 7.5 hours a day M - F (37.5 hours right there), and the better part of the day during the weekend if i decide to just veg out and relax. i've sat around watching movies all weekend about 15+ hours a day. So i can get up to 67.5 or more hours of tv and movies in easily, i'd say average is probably easily 50 for me. And i work 40 hours a week. That said, sometimes i'm watching a tv show or movie in the background only while playing a game or doing household chores or something.

but still i could see 5 hours a day being easily possible for people.
 
BoogerBomb said:
All of sue broke ass fucks that cant afford to do anything or dont want to because everything you do in life costs a fucking fortune.
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Don't they have like, jobs and families and stuff, though? I do anyway, and I don't even have time for the vegging out I'd like to be doing.
 
RazorWind said:
Don't they have like, jobs and families and stuff, though? I do anyway, and I don't even have time for the vegging out I'd like to be doing.
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maybe, maybe not. I don't have a family so that is how i'm able to spend crazy amounts of time just sitting around the house.

but still mom staying at home with kids could easily watch 5 hours of kids shows a day. Maybe parents watch the news in the morning getting ready for work, watch it again when they get home, then the family all sit down and watch some shows at night. Parents watch a few more after the kids go to bed.

If you don't have time to just veg out for a little bit every now and then, you are living too crazy of a life. That or you actually have money to spend doing stuff which is good. but not all can afford to go out and do stuff so they sit around home. Some might sit and play board games, others just sit and watch tv / movies.
 
Steve said:
Extrapolating the results of a telephone survey of 2,000 people into "Of all U.S. households..." invites idiots like me to make fun of those survey results.
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If these surveys are anything like the election polls, they make sure that their makeup is across all socio-political, racial, religious, age, income and other groups.

With a sample size of 2000, if it is properly selected you can get some pretty damned accurate data.

Consider this: The "rule of thumb" for statistical analysis when dealing with normal data, is that 30 samples are sufficient to infer decent results on the population. Your level of confidence will vary based on your standard deviation, but 30 is - in most cases - good enough to get decent results.

When I write protocols for analysis of medical devices to ensure that they are constructed properly, after a thorough power analysis, I rarely wind up needing more than 60 samples to prove at the 95% certainty level that the design will be safe.

The size of the population really doesn't matter much., as long as you sample well. 2000 samples will give you similar accuracy whether your population is 100,000 or it is 350,000,000...
 
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