First, to offer full disclosure, I am not a fan of the monopolistic company called Nielsen.  In fact, I think they are one of the most arrogant, inaccurate, over-priced companies in America.  Back in my days as general manger of a TV station in Columbus I took great delight in battling my Nielsen rep at every turn.

So I had to chuckle when I read their news release on the need to move the February sweeps to March in 2009 "to ensure the most accurate measurement with no glitches."  My first thought – why should the 2009 sweeps be any different than any other NSI sweeps period which is always inaccurate with glitches?

In talking to a number of group heads and vice presidents, I have learned there is growing sentiment to simply throwing out the "March" sweeps.  That is understandable since moving the sweeps back a month causes many problems – such as taking the Super Bowl out of the ratings period, and putting the NCAA tournament right smack in the middle of the March sweeps as it disrupts viewing and newscast times for all CBS affiliates.

So, I have a suggestion for all of you – band together as a group and tell Nielsen "no" – tell them to simply cancel the "March sweeps" – and, by the way, tell them you are not going to pay them for the month of February either.   After all, if they are so concerned about inaccuracies due to the HD switch, why should your station suffer with, and pay for, wobbly numbers?

Maybe that will get their attention!

Jim Willi

This entry was posted on Monday, May 19th, 2008 at 4:05 pm and is filed under Willi. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.