WEBVTT - SYSK Selects: How TV Ratings Work 0:00:03.040 --> 0:00:06.240 Hey, everybody, Happy Saturday. It's Chuck here with another Stuff 0:00:06.240 --> 0:00:08.879 you Should Know select this week everyone, I picked out 0:00:09.360 --> 0:00:12.160 an episode about TV ratings because I don't know. I 0:00:12.200 --> 0:00:15.800 love TV and it's interesting. This from September two, fourteen, 0:00:16.160 --> 0:00:21.200 and I hope you enjoyed. Welcome to Stuff you Should Know, 0:00:21.440 --> 0:00:29.840 a production of My Heart Radios How Stuff Works. Hey, 0:00:29.880 --> 0:00:33.000 and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's Charles W. 0:00:33.240 --> 0:00:39.680 Chuckers Bryant, and there's Jerry W. Jerre Rowland. Actually, Jerry 0:00:39.720 --> 0:00:42.800 has been canceled, okay, due to low ratings. You know 0:00:42.920 --> 0:00:46.960 it's funny, is um? Jerry has been portrayed on television 0:00:47.240 --> 0:00:49.360 and a TV show that was canceled due to poor ratings, 0:00:49.400 --> 0:00:51.880 poor ratings. That was our show. That was our show. 0:00:51.920 --> 0:00:54.320 We had a television show once. It was called Stuff 0:00:54.360 --> 0:00:59.000 you Should Know. It was a slightly fictionalized version of 0:00:59.080 --> 0:01:02.960 our life, our work life. We made a sitcom. Yeah 0:01:03.000 --> 0:01:06.040 we did. It's pretty cool and a lot of people 0:01:06.040 --> 0:01:07.319 loved it, and a lot of people are like, what 0:01:07.360 --> 0:01:08.959 in the world did you do it that way? For? 0:01:09.360 --> 0:01:12.920 So that a lot it's like basically ten and ten. 0:01:13.360 --> 0:01:15.680 Oh yeah, you're referring to the Tony people who've seen 0:01:15.720 --> 0:01:20.679 this show. Yeah, actually we'll get to that all. But we, um, 0:01:20.720 --> 0:01:23.120 we know a little bit about how TV ratings work 0:01:23.200 --> 0:01:26.679 because of that, and uh, in some ways, I believe 0:01:26.720 --> 0:01:33.080 we're a victim of the antiquated system that is the 0:01:33.200 --> 0:01:38.200 Nielsen TV ratings. Now, dude, it's it's it's antiquated. Why 0:01:38.200 --> 0:01:41.440 it's changing. I do not disagree with the antiquated part. 0:01:41.520 --> 0:01:43.479 What I do disagree with is that had it been 0:01:43.560 --> 0:01:45.759 up to date, I think it would have had zero 0:01:45.840 --> 0:01:48.160 impact on our success. I don't know, man, I will 0:01:48.160 --> 0:01:51.920 say this to the people out there. What um, what 0:01:52.000 --> 0:01:55.360 the network did was they looked only at one number, 0:01:55.600 --> 0:01:58.280 which is the amount of people that sat down in 0:01:58.320 --> 0:02:01.720 front of their television set on a Saturday night live 0:02:02.480 --> 0:02:06.000 at ten pm to watch our show. Right. They did 0:02:06.000 --> 0:02:08.720 not count things that we'll talk about like online streaming 0:02:09.280 --> 0:02:13.360 or DVR um or anything like that, which is what 0:02:13.480 --> 0:02:17.080 makes it antiquated. Because it's it's changing, man, people aren't 0:02:17.080 --> 0:02:19.880 watching TV like they used to. But they're basing a 0:02:19.880 --> 0:02:24.560 lot of these uh decisions on a system that was 0:02:24.600 --> 0:02:28.079 designed in the nineteen fifties. So let's go back, man, 0:02:28.280 --> 0:02:32.239 it goes back even further than that. Back in the A. C. 0:02:32.480 --> 0:02:38.320 Nielsen Company started. At the time, people who were broadcasting 0:02:38.400 --> 0:02:42.000 radio wanted to know what people were listening to. So 0:02:42.040 --> 0:02:45.079 there are a lot of companies that would telephone up 0:02:45.840 --> 0:02:49.280 family at random and say, say, fella, what are you 0:02:49.360 --> 0:02:52.120 listening to right now on the old Victor Rola The 0:02:52.120 --> 0:02:55.160 Amazing Adventure AWA, and uh he'd say, hey, thanks a lot, 0:02:55.200 --> 0:02:57.959 bub talk to you later, and they'd hang up a 0:02:58.200 --> 0:03:01.160 nickel fill your trouble. So that they because we're talking 0:03:01.200 --> 0:03:06.400 depression at this time, um, well not later on, they 0:03:06.440 --> 0:03:08.560 wish the head a nickel. Here's a chicken for your pot. 0:03:10.040 --> 0:03:12.359 That's a Hoover reference. Man, you don't get those two 0:03:12.440 --> 0:03:17.359 often try to bust them out. So the Nielsen Company said, 0:03:17.440 --> 0:03:19.519 that's all fine and good. That's great that you guys 0:03:19.520 --> 0:03:21.560 are figuring out what people are listening to, but we 0:03:21.639 --> 0:03:25.720 have something even better because we are a technological powerhouse. 0:03:26.120 --> 0:03:29.720 And what they did was they randomly picked some families 0:03:29.760 --> 0:03:33.320 around America and said, say, can we put this cool 0:03:33.400 --> 0:03:36.960 recording device in your home near your radio and it 0:03:37.040 --> 0:03:39.480 will record what you're listening to at any given time, 0:03:39.840 --> 0:03:42.000 and then we'll send technicians out to pick it up 0:03:42.000 --> 0:03:45.080 from time to time to get the information off of 0:03:45.120 --> 0:03:46.840 it and then bring it back so we can keep 0:03:46.880 --> 0:03:50.480 recording it. And family said sure, and the Nielsen Company's 0:03:50.560 --> 0:03:56.720 domination of broadcast ratings was sealed. After that point, everybody 0:03:57.000 --> 0:04:00.120 from every competitor they had was just peanuts can here 0:04:00.200 --> 0:04:03.440 to the Nielsen Company, so much so that when you 0:04:03.520 --> 0:04:07.600 hear TV ratings, it's synonymous with Nielsen ratings, very much 0:04:07.640 --> 0:04:11.080 like Kleenex and UH facial tissue are one and the 0:04:11.120 --> 0:04:16.920 same same thing thanks to Nielsen's technological powerhouse. The irony 0:04:16.960 --> 0:04:20.120 of it, though, is that once they started installing those 0:04:20.160 --> 0:04:22.800 boxes in the twenties or thirties, and then they moved 0:04:22.800 --> 0:04:26.640 on to television sets, the innovation, I mean they innovated 0:04:26.680 --> 0:04:32.520 somewhat fundamentally principally, it remained the same until a year 0:04:32.600 --> 0:04:35.840 or two ago. Yeah, and they're not, um, we'll get 0:04:35.880 --> 0:04:40.440 into all the hardware of the the hardware side of 0:04:40.480 --> 0:04:43.240 how it works. But what they did in nur with 0:04:43.360 --> 0:04:46.440 send actual little diaries that you would fill out and 0:04:46.760 --> 0:04:51.320 pencil and send back. And they still do that today 0:04:51.680 --> 0:04:53.640 in two thousand fourteen, even though in two thousand six 0:04:53.680 --> 0:04:56.119 they said they were going to stop they still send 0:04:56.120 --> 0:04:57.919 those little diaries and you get a little diary in 0:04:57.920 --> 0:05:01.400 the mail with five one dollar bill really in the 0:05:01.520 --> 0:05:05.599 envelope for your troubles. And they look like the modern nickel. 0:05:05.800 --> 0:05:10.359 Yeah exactly. And they rely on lazy, dishonest people to 0:05:10.520 --> 0:05:14.159 fill out this card and mail it back and then 0:05:14.240 --> 0:05:16.719 go spend that five dollars on a on a grande 0:05:16.720 --> 0:05:21.279 a latte. It would have gotten a lot more. Oh man, 0:05:21.360 --> 0:05:24.520 you could have bought a car. But but that is 0:05:24.600 --> 0:05:28.359 the diary version. What UM and and the networks and 0:05:28.400 --> 0:05:31.400 advertisers have never liked the diary version. They still don't know. 0:05:31.440 --> 0:05:35.520 But it's what's called sweep sweek, which is hard to say. 0:05:35.640 --> 0:05:37.320 That's right, we'll get it sweeps in a second. But 0:05:37.520 --> 0:05:40.480 um what they mainly like to rely on are two 0:05:40.480 --> 0:05:45.599 different electronic hardware methods UM the set meters as in 0:05:45.640 --> 0:05:49.279 TV set and people meters. And right now they have 0:05:49.800 --> 0:05:56.280 by they plan to have more than sixty TV set meters. 0:05:56.400 --> 0:05:58.040 And this is just for the U. S and Canada, 0:05:58.080 --> 0:06:03.520 by the way, because everyone else is TV is weird. Yeah, simon, 0:06:03.600 --> 0:06:05.400 do you ever watched TV in different countries when you're 0:06:05.400 --> 0:06:07.520 traveling and stuff? Yes, And it is so much fun. 0:06:08.040 --> 0:06:10.200 It is fun, but after a while you're like, I 0:06:10.279 --> 0:06:12.640 really miss American TV. Yeah, but I mean, if you're 0:06:12.640 --> 0:06:14.280 traveling abroad, you shouldn't be watching a whole lot of 0:06:14.839 --> 0:06:16.920 it was like late night in the hotel. It's one 0:06:16.960 --> 0:06:18.840 of but it's one of the great pluses is you're 0:06:18.880 --> 0:06:20.719 just like, I don't feel like watching this, will go 0:06:20.720 --> 0:06:23.320 out and see the sights instead. Yeah. I think I 0:06:23.360 --> 0:06:26.040 was in Belgium watching TV with my buddy Brett years 0:06:26.040 --> 0:06:29.440 and years ago, and uh that was translated in English 0:06:29.440 --> 0:06:32.920 and subtitles and one of the characters said something and 0:06:33.040 --> 0:06:34.960 I guess I don't know if it was Flemish, and 0:06:35.000 --> 0:06:37.840 the other guy just looked and said I and it 0:06:37.920 --> 0:06:41.080 said me too. So we still say that today when 0:06:41.120 --> 0:06:43.080 we're responding me to do each other, we'll go I 0:06:44.720 --> 0:06:48.600 all those years later. So anyway, Um, the set, Yeah, 0:06:48.640 --> 0:06:53.440 I said there were SI in thirty one uh markets, 0:06:53.480 --> 0:07:00.400 TV markets, and then there are about thirty five thousand, 0:07:01.080 --> 0:07:06.440 I believe. Now people meeters in those homes. I'm sorry 0:07:06.440 --> 0:07:10.320 in about homes and those people meeters are more specific 0:07:11.160 --> 0:07:14.320 because you can have three people meeters in one house. 0:07:14.440 --> 0:07:16.640 We want to see what little Susie's watching. We want 0:07:16.640 --> 0:07:19.400 to see what her brother Randy's watching, and they won't 0:07:19.480 --> 0:07:23.120 see what her dad watches. Chafter everyone's gone to bed, 0:07:24.160 --> 0:07:25.600 so each one of them will have their own little 0:07:25.600 --> 0:07:28.120 people meeter that they'll turn on. And I always thought 0:07:28.120 --> 0:07:30.800 that these things were connected to your television like your 0:07:30.840 --> 0:07:33.880 cable box and it just kind of read the information. 0:07:33.920 --> 0:07:37.560 But they're actually listening devices. Isn't that weird? Totally blew 0:07:37.600 --> 0:07:40.320 my mind. So basically at the podcast and the way 0:07:40.400 --> 0:07:44.480 that the way that Nielsen figures out what TV show 0:07:44.480 --> 0:07:47.400 you're talking to is because they have a device that's 0:07:47.400 --> 0:07:51.520 connected to the Internet that um is eaves dropping on 0:07:51.600 --> 0:07:56.000 your TV. And they just in two thousand and six 0:07:56.160 --> 0:07:59.440 finally got to the point where they perfected this technology 0:07:59.520 --> 0:08:03.720 and they have of codes that broadcasters, the networks and 0:08:03.760 --> 0:08:06.960 the local affiliates have to put in to their audio 0:08:07.080 --> 0:08:10.960 stream the audio video stream that just the audio stream. 0:08:11.200 --> 0:08:13.200 Is it just audio? Yeah, but they're trying to come 0:08:13.280 --> 0:08:16.800 up with the video version. So basically, there's a a sound, 0:08:16.880 --> 0:08:19.320 there's a frequency that you can't hear. I don't even 0:08:19.360 --> 0:08:21.600 think your dog can hear it, but it comes through 0:08:21.640 --> 0:08:25.320 your TV and your Nielsen box can hear it. And 0:08:25.360 --> 0:08:29.240 it's a it's basically an audio fingerprint for a show. 0:08:29.880 --> 0:08:32.920 And when the Nielsen box here's that audio, it can 0:08:32.960 --> 0:08:35.400 be like, oh, well they're watching good Times right now. 0:08:35.520 --> 0:08:38.559 That's funny. I was just thinking that good Times, yeah, 0:08:38.600 --> 0:08:40.640 and then I was like, no, I should say Three's 0:08:40.679 --> 0:08:44.040 Company instead. It's depends and then he said good Times. 0:08:44.080 --> 0:08:46.120 Although if you watch Good Times long enough, there's an 0:08:46.160 --> 0:08:48.960 episode of Three's Company coming on eventually on that channel. 0:08:49.080 --> 0:08:51.360 That's I think good Times maybe my favorite all time 0:08:51.600 --> 0:08:54.880 theme song. That's a good one. Oh man, it's so good, 0:08:55.120 --> 0:08:58.679 it's ridiculous. Did I tell you Henry Mancini did the 0:08:59.640 --> 0:09:03.120 the What's Happening theme song? Yes? What episode was that 0:09:03.280 --> 0:09:07.600 in just a few ago? That was number Stations? Because 0:09:07.640 --> 0:09:11.760 the sound that the short wave thing mean, so uh. 0:09:12.080 --> 0:09:15.000 That's how Nielsen's been figuring out what people are watching, 0:09:15.000 --> 0:09:18.319 which is mind blowing. It's also if it seems a 0:09:18.320 --> 0:09:23.640 little backwards, yeah, it may be emblematic of a larger 0:09:24.040 --> 0:09:30.800 systematic resistance towards technological improvement. Yeah, or if it seems 0:09:30.840 --> 0:09:33.920 a little small as far as the sample pool goes um, 0:09:34.040 --> 0:09:36.160 which it is it is. But what they do is 0:09:36.160 --> 0:09:40.760 they extrapolate that number, just like polsters do, and they say, 0:09:40.880 --> 0:09:45.640 well this, these are average markets, these are average families. Um, 0:09:45.679 --> 0:09:50.440 so if these eventually TV sets are watching this, we 0:09:50.480 --> 0:09:54.040 can pull that out and and do some sort of 0:09:54.160 --> 0:09:56.560 They probably do it on a chalkboard in a room. 0:09:56.600 --> 0:09:59.199 There's this one guy who has the piece of chalk 0:09:59.559 --> 0:10:01.719 and the rapp Late sets out and says, well, this 0:10:01.800 --> 0:10:05.080 is what America is watching, which always has bugged me, 0:10:05.679 --> 0:10:07.720 especially when you have a TV show that gets canceled. 0:10:07.760 --> 0:10:09.959 It is because it all comes down to just how 0:10:10.080 --> 0:10:13.440 representative is your sample. So there's six TV sets there 0:10:14.640 --> 0:10:18.640 by two thousand fifteen, right now in two thousand fourteen, 0:10:18.679 --> 0:10:20.600 may have two thousand fourteen. There are a hundred and 0:10:20.640 --> 0:10:24.240 sixteen point three million TV sets in the US. So 0:10:24.280 --> 0:10:27.360 this is a very small sample size. But if the 0:10:27.400 --> 0:10:31.200 guy with the chalk um Bert can can come up 0:10:31.200 --> 0:10:34.200 with a very good representative portion of the US. Like 0:10:34.400 --> 0:10:40.280 there's this many um divorced Hispanic families, there's this many 0:10:40.400 --> 0:10:45.040 um gay Asian households. There's like this many you know, 0:10:45.520 --> 0:10:48.240 Mitt Romney voters, And like they take all these guys 0:10:48.440 --> 0:10:52.480 and put them together and it's a clear cross section 0:10:52.559 --> 0:10:55.280 of America. That's America. Baby, you should be able to 0:10:55.360 --> 0:11:00.560 extrapolate pretty pretty well from that, that's true. It just 0:11:00.640 --> 0:11:03.839 all depends on how good their statisticians are, that's right. 0:11:03.880 --> 0:11:06.920 And they do audits over the years and quality checks 0:11:06.920 --> 0:11:10.920 of course, and compare ratings from different samples. So it's 0:11:10.960 --> 0:11:13.200 not like they just said it, I saw we're doing it, 0:11:13.720 --> 0:11:16.080 although they sort of do that, but they do they 0:11:16.120 --> 0:11:18.880 do quality checks of course. Yeah. One of the problems 0:11:18.960 --> 0:11:22.840 is like there's been so few challenges from outside competition 0:11:22.880 --> 0:11:25.959 that Nielsen can do whatever it wants, and it's so 0:11:26.040 --> 0:11:30.600 powerful that it literally has the entire television industry at 0:11:30.640 --> 0:11:35.040 its feet. It decides what rating a TV show gets, 0:11:35.040 --> 0:11:37.600 and ultimately the whole point to all of this stuff, 0:11:37.640 --> 0:11:41.560 to TV ratings in general, is so that networks and 0:11:41.559 --> 0:11:48.760 their local affiliates can set advertising rates for advertisers. There's 0:11:48.840 --> 0:11:52.839 seventy eight billion dollars at stake. That's the advertising spent 0:11:52.960 --> 0:11:55.840 in a year on television, and it all comes down 0:11:55.840 --> 0:11:59.920 to what rating Nielsen, with their representative sample and their 0:12:00.040 --> 0:12:03.840 audio eavesdropping boxes and their five dollar bills in a 0:12:03.920 --> 0:12:09.360 paper diary, decide that your TV show got. That's right. 0:12:09.600 --> 0:12:13.040 That's the dirty little secret. Is that they don't care 0:12:13.200 --> 0:12:15.559 how many people are watching that TV show. They care 0:12:15.600 --> 0:12:18.480 about how many people are watching the commercials. Yeah, that's 0:12:18.520 --> 0:12:22.479 really what they're looking at, and more specifically what demographic, 0:12:22.520 --> 0:12:24.440 which is why I don't think we mentioned why the 0:12:24.480 --> 0:12:27.480 people meters are so valuable, because they want to get 0:12:27.480 --> 0:12:30.719 that specific demo so they can show advertisers eighteen to 0:12:30.760 --> 0:12:32.439 forty nine year olds. They spend a ton of money 0:12:32.679 --> 0:12:37.280 and they're watching, uh, they're watching Community, but no one 0:12:37.320 --> 0:12:40.559 else is, so we'll cancel Community, which is kind of crazy, 0:12:40.559 --> 0:12:43.320 as we'll see in a little a little while. Yeah, 0:12:43.320 --> 0:12:45.400 but um, just quickly let me go over. I think 0:12:45.440 --> 0:12:47.520 most people know this. But if you've got a half 0:12:47.559 --> 0:12:50.160 hour TV show and um, you're gonna have twenty two 0:12:50.200 --> 0:12:53.480 minutes of uh TV show, then you're gonna have eight 0:12:53.480 --> 0:12:56.760 minutes of commercial. Six of those are national ads sold 0:12:56.760 --> 0:12:59.640 by the network, and then your local affiliate is that's 0:12:59.679 --> 0:13:02.520 where you're gonna get your awesome commercials. Hey just for 0:13:02.559 --> 0:13:06.240 the Wolfman two minutes worth or crazy Eddie. I remember 0:13:06.360 --> 0:13:08.440 was big up in the Northeast. And then so this 0:13:08.480 --> 0:13:10.960 is two thousand and six. I couldn't find one recently, 0:13:11.000 --> 0:13:13.840 but back in two thousand and six. You if you're 0:13:13.840 --> 0:13:16.760 buying a commercial slot from a local affiliate, you're gonna 0:13:16.800 --> 0:13:20.080 pay about a hundred dollars to two thousand dollars depending 0:13:20.080 --> 0:13:22.720 on This is during the daytime. This isn't like three am, 0:13:23.120 --> 0:13:25.680 but depending on what show. So, like back when Oprah 0:13:25.840 --> 0:13:28.560 was on, you could get a thirty second spot for 0:13:28.720 --> 0:13:32.319 ninety bucks you could affiliate. Yeah, you could also pay 0:13:32.400 --> 0:13:35.000 up to two thousand dollars for it, and then apparently 0:13:35.040 --> 0:13:38.600 you're going to double that for um a national ad 0:13:38.760 --> 0:13:42.000 for a thirty second spot during the day which isn't 0:13:42.120 --> 0:13:45.960 just not outlandish. Well that's how crazy, Eddie, I mean, yeah, 0:13:46.280 --> 0:13:47.880 or the Wolfman, they don't have a ton of money. 0:13:49.000 --> 0:13:51.640 Although I don't know a wolfman wore a lot of jewelry. Yeah, 0:13:51.679 --> 0:13:53.200 that's true. For those of you who don't know who 0:13:53.240 --> 0:13:56.720 the Wolfman is, we understand because you probably didn't live 0:13:56.840 --> 0:14:00.600 in Atlanta. Yeah, I bet its Southeast. I bet it 0:14:00.640 --> 0:14:03.040 was on like WTVS and stuff. All you have to 0:14:03.080 --> 0:14:07.840 do is go type in Wolfman Donna gallery furniture into 0:14:07.920 --> 0:14:10.960 the YouTube's and it will show you some classic gallery 0:14:10.960 --> 0:14:13.439 furniture ads, or just type in hey, ask for the 0:14:13.440 --> 0:14:16.920 Wolfman no, ask for Donna. I don't remember that part. 0:14:17.120 --> 0:14:19.840 What you don't remember Donna his daughter with the hair. 0:14:21.240 --> 0:14:24.320 The whole premise of the ad man wanted you to 0:14:24.400 --> 0:14:27.240 come see him, and she'd say, hey, ask for the 0:14:27.240 --> 0:14:54.360 wolf Man. She go, no, ask for Donna. All right, 0:14:54.640 --> 0:14:59.080 Sweeps everyone's heard it. Um it is a bit everywhere. Yeah, 0:14:59.080 --> 0:15:01.160 everyone hears about you know this is SWEEPS weeks. That's 0:15:01.160 --> 0:15:03.520 when well, well we'll tell you what it is. This 0:15:03.560 --> 0:15:07.480 is the fact that the podcast. To me what SWEEPS week? Yeah, 0:15:07.560 --> 0:15:10.600 where it came from and why it exists. Well, in 0:15:11.600 --> 0:15:15.680 is when they started sending out those TV diaries and uh, 0:15:15.880 --> 0:15:19.400 they made a geographic sweep starting in the northeast across 0:15:19.440 --> 0:15:22.320 the country from east to west, and they collected the 0:15:22.320 --> 0:15:28.000 little booklets and those were our first reportings of TV writings. 0:15:28.040 --> 0:15:31.680 So before they had they had the eavesdropping boxes that 0:15:31.760 --> 0:15:35.480 they were using. But it was basically like um, this 0:15:35.640 --> 0:15:39.000 this These are I think maybe up to twenty thousand 0:15:39.120 --> 0:15:43.320 households at one point in the major markets. The the 0:15:43.360 --> 0:15:45.440 great thing about the paper diaries is they could go 0:15:45.480 --> 0:15:49.200 into local markets, smaller markets and find out not just 0:15:49.280 --> 0:15:51.800 what you know, the people in New York or l 0:15:51.880 --> 0:15:54.680 A or Chicago were watching, but what the people and 0:15:54.840 --> 0:15:57.880 you know Santa Fe were watching too, or you know 0:15:58.400 --> 0:16:01.120 Fort Lauderdale. Yeah, those are saying, how does it play 0:16:01.160 --> 0:16:07.040 in Santa Fe? Sheboygan or something probably or Walla, Walla, 0:16:07.440 --> 0:16:09.400 I can't remember. It may have been a movie thing too, 0:16:09.400 --> 0:16:11.560 but that there's an industry saying how does it play 0:16:11.560 --> 0:16:14.600 in the city. It's out of rhyme, because that's what matters, 0:16:14.880 --> 0:16:16.600 you know. Of course New York, in l A and 0:16:16.600 --> 0:16:20.240 the major markets are going to consume. Uh, they want 0:16:20.240 --> 0:16:23.280 to know what your average household wants to see, right, 0:16:23.320 --> 0:16:26.960 And this is this is the first time that anyone 0:16:27.000 --> 0:16:31.240 had ever taken a really comprehensive snapshot of what America 0:16:31.600 --> 0:16:34.840 was watching in a given week. And so they said, hey, 0:16:34.880 --> 0:16:37.760 this worked really well. We're gonna start doing this every year. 0:16:37.960 --> 0:16:40.720 We're gonna have what's now called a sweeps week and 0:16:40.760 --> 0:16:43.280 it's going to be on this week. And so the 0:16:43.320 --> 0:16:45.840 TV executive said, well, wait a minute, wait a minute, 0:16:46.160 --> 0:16:49.000 Sweeps Week, this is what we're gonna start setting our 0:16:49.040 --> 0:16:52.000 advertising rates against. And it's going to be this week, 0:16:52.200 --> 0:16:54.960 and I'm going to do the craziest stuff I can 0:16:55.040 --> 0:16:59.040 think of to get ratings as as big and wide 0:16:59.080 --> 0:17:02.360 as I possibly can grab on that week, and that 0:17:02.760 --> 0:17:05.919 is where sweep Sweet came from. And we've seen some 0:17:06.000 --> 0:17:09.400 pretty interesting things as a result of Sweeps weak. Yeah, 0:17:09.440 --> 0:17:13.119 there's um a great tradition of stunt casting during sweeps week. 0:17:13.440 --> 0:17:15.520 Justin Bieber will show up on c S. I. I 0:17:15.560 --> 0:17:17.240 didn't see that one, did you? And I don't watch 0:17:17.240 --> 0:17:18.960 that show, and if I did, I would have punched 0:17:19.000 --> 0:17:22.920 my TV if he showed up on it. Um, if 0:17:22.960 --> 0:17:25.640 you're gonna shoot JR, you're gonna do it during sweeps weeks. 0:17:25.680 --> 0:17:28.040 Oh yeah. The late night talk shows are gonna load 0:17:28.119 --> 0:17:31.000 up their their biggest A list guests during sweeps week. 0:17:31.280 --> 0:17:34.320 E R did a live show. Yeah. I actually watched 0:17:34.359 --> 0:17:35.679 that one, and I wasn't an e R fan. I 0:17:35.720 --> 0:17:37.040 just wanted to see if they could pull it off. 0:17:37.080 --> 0:17:39.679 Yeah right, it's pretty cool. Ellen used to have a 0:17:39.680 --> 0:17:42.560 sitcom based on her life and she came out on 0:17:42.720 --> 0:17:45.679 that show during sweep sweek. Oh yeah, that's right. And 0:17:46.600 --> 0:17:50.840 very famously there was a not one, not too but 0:17:51.040 --> 0:17:55.399 thrice part Happy Days where Fonzie jumps a shark on 0:17:55.480 --> 0:17:58.760 water skis that sweeps that happened during sweep Sweek. Wow, 0:17:58.800 --> 0:18:02.760 that's a sweeps failure. Well, i'll know if people watched it. Yeah, 0:18:02.920 --> 0:18:04.480 I don't guess you can call it a failure because 0:18:04.480 --> 0:18:07.400 that's probably US iconic. Yeah, it's part of the lexicon. 0:18:07.440 --> 0:18:10.960 Now do you remember an arrested development where Henry Winkler 0:18:11.040 --> 0:18:17.280 jumps over Shark Classic. Uh, these days, sweep Sweek is 0:18:17.320 --> 0:18:23.000 actually sixteen weeks because they have I don't know, but 0:18:23.200 --> 0:18:25.680 narrowed it down. They broadened it out to four four 0:18:25.720 --> 0:18:30.000 week periods in November of February, May and July, and um, 0:18:30.359 --> 0:18:33.959 they still tried out uh special things for sweeps but 0:18:34.080 --> 0:18:36.159 it's not It definitely doesn't have the teeth that it 0:18:36.280 --> 0:18:39.880 used to because the way that people consume media these days, 0:18:39.880 --> 0:18:42.720 which we're gonna you know, start getting into. So no, 0:18:42.960 --> 0:18:44.880 it doesn't have the teeth that it used to. And 0:18:44.880 --> 0:18:47.520 and as a result, um, a lot of networks have 0:18:47.680 --> 0:18:50.520 kind of stopped, like you said, doing the stunt casting 0:18:50.520 --> 0:18:55.240 and that kind of stuff. But it's still as a um, um, 0:18:55.280 --> 0:18:59.439 it's still basically holding broadcast TV hostage because that is 0:18:59.480 --> 0:19:03.280 still what advertisers want to see, Well, what are your 0:19:03.359 --> 0:19:06.000 ratings during sweeps Week? And that's what they set their 0:19:06.040 --> 0:19:09.520 ad rates against So the fact that there are these 0:19:09.600 --> 0:19:15.000 four month long sweeps weeks, um means that the broadcasters 0:19:15.040 --> 0:19:19.160 have to follow the normal fall the summer broadcast model 0:19:19.240 --> 0:19:25.720 with reruns in between. Yeah. And this is for for NBC, ABC, CBS, Fox, 0:19:25.760 --> 0:19:29.480 like the major broadcast networks non cable networks, which is 0:19:29.640 --> 0:19:37.480 a completely dying beast. Yeah, because they rely exclusively on advertising, 0:19:38.280 --> 0:19:41.720 and cable has been eating their lunch because advertising has 0:19:41.760 --> 0:19:44.440 been going down. It looks like it's already peaked. It's 0:19:44.440 --> 0:19:48.120 still seventy eight million dollars billion billion. Yes, you're right, 0:19:48.560 --> 0:19:52.400 but cable takes a huge substantial portion of that in advertising. 0:19:53.200 --> 0:19:56.280 But then even when advertising rates go down, cable still 0:19:56.320 --> 0:20:00.320 survives because cable makes money off of subscriber fees yep, 0:20:00.760 --> 0:20:03.960 and transmission fees to yeah exactly, which is why a 0:20:04.000 --> 0:20:08.240 cable has a big leg up. And also they can, um, 0:20:08.359 --> 0:20:10.880 they don't have a traditional television season. They can release 0:20:10.920 --> 0:20:14.880 stuff all year long and uh, you can binge watch it, yeah, 0:20:14.920 --> 0:20:17.840 which is happening. That's that's the new model. So, like 0:20:17.880 --> 0:20:20.640 we said, for many years, um Nielsen was just kind 0:20:20.680 --> 0:20:24.840 of as this one Wired article, the Nielsen family is dead. 0:20:24.880 --> 0:20:28.320 Put it it was in a torpor. And the first 0:20:28.320 --> 0:20:32.720 thing that really perfect um the first thing that really 0:20:32.840 --> 0:20:38.399 roused um Nielsen was DVRs because when DVRs came along, 0:20:38.720 --> 0:20:42.240 the advertising industry was like, oh god, people can fast 0:20:42.320 --> 0:20:45.639 forward through ads now. Yeah, like they've always dreamed of 0:20:45.680 --> 0:20:49.000 doing exactly now they can. And it was the basically 0:20:49.080 --> 0:20:53.080 the television apocalypse and that didn't pan out because advertisers 0:20:53.080 --> 0:20:55.480 figured out that, yeah, people can ever, we can fast 0:20:55.480 --> 0:20:58.320 forward two ads, but there's ways to still get your 0:20:58.359 --> 0:21:01.440 message across at sixteen time speed. You can do things 0:21:01.520 --> 0:21:04.720 called popbusters where you use the actors or the look 0:21:04.800 --> 0:21:07.040 or the set of the TV show that you're advertising 0:21:07.080 --> 0:21:09.479 within to make them think like the show just came 0:21:09.520 --> 0:21:11.560 back on and you caught them yep. Because it's really 0:21:11.600 --> 0:21:14.159 an ad um there's all sorts of stuff you can do. 0:21:14.200 --> 0:21:17.520 So it hasn't been an advertising apocalypse. And as a result, 0:21:17.680 --> 0:21:20.320 because DVRs are clearly clearly here to stay and have 0:21:20.480 --> 0:21:24.360 been since you know, the early two thousand's, um Nielsen 0:21:24.440 --> 0:21:26.800 has had to kind of finally be like, Okay, we 0:21:26.800 --> 0:21:28.679 need to innovate a little bit and figure out how 0:21:28.760 --> 0:21:33.880 to include DVR because not everybody's sitting down at eight 0:21:33.880 --> 0:21:37.280 o'clock on a Monday night and watching Murder, she wrote, 0:21:37.600 --> 0:21:40.359 nobody is Man. I watched a couple of episodes the 0:21:40.359 --> 0:21:44.040 other night. I love that show. I've never seen one episode. 0:21:44.280 --> 0:21:48.200 What I know, man, it is good? Is it's good? 0:21:49.119 --> 0:21:52.560 M Another thing too? Uh just the backtrack is I've 0:21:52.600 --> 0:21:56.520 noticed lately is um, you're on demand watching, which a 0:21:56.560 --> 0:22:00.600 lot of cable companies. I'm a Comcast person by because 0:22:00.640 --> 0:22:03.600 I'm forced to be. Yeah, um yeah, a lot of 0:22:03.640 --> 0:22:06.639 the the on demand shows now within the first like 0:22:06.840 --> 0:22:08.880 a couple of weeks that they're available, you can't fast 0:22:08.880 --> 0:22:11.560 forward through. Oh yeah, Like do you hit the fast 0:22:11.600 --> 0:22:16.080 forward button and a little null sign comes up and says, sorry, 0:22:16.320 --> 0:22:22.000 you're gonna have to sit through this. The DVR, I 0:22:22.040 --> 0:22:25.679 guess the fact that the DVR is connected to the 0:22:25.760 --> 0:22:30.760 internet and is because it's getting show information. The the 0:22:30.840 --> 0:22:33.639 actual show is being recorded on your physical hard drive. 0:22:34.000 --> 0:22:37.399 I'm sure there's cloud DVR recorders or whatever, but for 0:22:37.440 --> 0:22:40.000 the most part, there's a hard drive that's recording shows 0:22:40.400 --> 0:22:43.800 onto your DVR. And then the other capability is that 0:22:43.880 --> 0:22:45.600 is connected to the internet, which is where it gets 0:22:45.640 --> 0:22:48.119 show information and all that stuff to present to you. 0:22:48.920 --> 0:22:51.520 But the Internet, as you may have figured out by now, 0:22:51.640 --> 0:22:54.679 is a two way street. Not only can information be 0:22:54.760 --> 0:22:57.239 downloaded to your home, it can be uploaded. And that 0:22:57.280 --> 0:23:01.920 includes your preferences. How what shows you watch, um, how 0:23:01.960 --> 0:23:04.240 often you watch them, when you watch them, and so 0:23:04.280 --> 0:23:07.080 all of a sudden, the DVR companies are like, hey, 0:23:07.480 --> 0:23:11.080 Nielsen's giving you guys like eight pm on NBC ratings. 0:23:11.720 --> 0:23:14.560 We've got all of these other ratings that they're not 0:23:14.600 --> 0:23:17.239 taking into account that you can get from us. Not 0:23:17.320 --> 0:23:20.160 only that, but they can actually tell when you're pausing 0:23:20.680 --> 0:23:25.520 your TV because the infamous nip slip hate even saying 0:23:25.560 --> 0:23:28.280 those words uh in the two thousand four Super Bowl 0:23:28.280 --> 0:23:32.840 with Janet Jackson, they uh TiVo the popular DVR company, 0:23:32.880 --> 0:23:35.639