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Other television audience measurement systems are available from other companies, as well as systems developed in joint ventures with Nielsen Media Research, such as AGB Nielsen Metivodia Research. Nielsen's ratings calculation, also called Cume Rating (or "Reach"), measures the number of unique viewers or households tuned to a television program in a particular time period during a week. The Cume itself is calculated by dividing the number of unique viewers or households by the total number of estimated available households/viewers/listeners possible. This gives a percentage Cume (cumulative) rating. http://www.nielsenmedia.com/ The system has been updated and modified extensively since it was developed in the early 1940s by Arthur Nielsen , and has since been the primary source of audience measurement information in the television industry around the world. Since television as a business makes money by selling audiences to advertisers, the Nielsen Television Ratings are the single most important element in determining Advertising rates, schedules, and program content. The company is part of the Nielsen Company , formerly known as VNU and owned by a consortium of Private Equity firms including Blackstone Group , KKR and Carlyle Group . Its production operations are located in its Brooker Creek Global Technology and Information Center in Oldsmar, Florida . MEASURING RATINGS Ratings / share and total viewers Nielsen Television Ratings are reported by ranking the percentage for each show of all viewers watching television at a given time. As of September 2006 , there are an estimated 115.2 million television households in the USA. A single national ratings point represents 1%, or 1,152,000 households for the 2006-07 season. '''Share''' is the percentage of television sets in use tuned to a specific program. These numbers are usually reported as (ratings points/share). For example, Nielsen may report a show as receiving a 9.2/15 during its broadcast, meaning 9.2%, or 10,598,400 households on average were tuned in at any given moment. Additionally, 15% of all televisions in use at the time were tuned into this program. Nielsen re-estimates the number of households each August for the upcoming television season. Nielsen Media Research also provides statistics on estimated total number of viewers, and on specific demographics. Advertising rates are influenced not only by the total number of viewers, but also by particular demographics, such as age, sex, economic class, and area. Younger viewers are considered more attractive for many products, whereas in some cases older and wealthier audiences are desired, or female audiences are desired over males. Television ratings are not an exact science, but they are a powerful force in determining the programming in an industry where millions of dollars are at stake every day. Because ratings are based on samples, it is possible for shows to get 0.0 rating, despite having an audience; CNBC talk show '' McEnroe '' was one notable example. |
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