You needn't look far to see this website has zero respect for the methodology of Nielsen, the audience measurement giant whose television ratings decide where billions of advertising dollars get spent. Employing household panels who volunteer to have their viewing habits tracked (in exchange for a small fee), Nielsen relies on Americans to report back to the company what they watched; Nielsen then expands that sample data to tell media buying agencies and network executives how many people across America tuned in to their show. Nielsen's entire measurement panel includes just 14,000 households; in 2000, the U.S. Census Bureau clocked 105,480,101 households in America. That means Nielsen uses just 0.0132 percent of the population to determine this nation's viewing habits.

The whole thing is flawed.

Young people, especially college students, go under-counted. Same for minorities. Entire urban markets may be represented by a frighteningly small number of homes. And the whole phenomenon of recording TV and watching it later? Nielsen has a frail and inadequate solution for measuring DVR viewership.

And yet, Nielsen represents its data as accurate, continues peddling it to anyone who will listen (read: everyone), and thus has more power than even the TV studios in deciding which shows get canceled because they don't pull in enough viewers. You can imagine Brooke Shields' frustration with this whole charade.

And now, finally, a television network with the balls to say something about Nielsen's crapshoot analysis is … saying something.

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Despite the dissolving marriage, fights with the kids, and plummeting net worth, there is at least one aspect of Sumner Redstone's stock that isn't completely sunk right now: CBS, which Redstone has a controlling stake in via his company National Amusements, is still going strong, despite having some of the most conventional fare on television. (See: Two and a Half Men, Big Bang Theory, How I Met Your Mother.) Not only is Two and a Half still the number one comedy on television, but after the dip in ratings during the political season, the Eye also saw a strong boost in the 18-49 demographic and is now leading in the ratings.

In total viewers, CBS was on top with 11.6 million, followed by ABC (10.4 million), NBC (7.8 million) and Fox (7 million).

For CBS, it was all about consistency, as the net stuck mostly with its regular lineup, which produced more winning nights in 18-49 than any other network.

One theory on the big win?

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Not convinced that a giant wave of depression is about to engulf everything from Boston to San Francisco? Consider this: Television viewing — something that's taken a beating as XBox 360 and iPhone purchases have exploded — is on the rise. Although you really shouldn't trust their data, Nielsen says the amount of time Joe Six Pack spent staring at his new plasma TV he can't afford spiked 4.1 percent, to 142 hours and 29 minutes per month (up 5hrs 35mins versus last year), reports MediaPost. That, and more actual people are watching TV: 1.6 percent more, bringing the total to 282.2 million per month. We know, numbers are hard, so understand it this way: More Americans are more often turning to the empty void of the small screen to ferret away their problems rather than, say, try and find a new job on Monster.com. Actually, that might not be true: Nielsen says overall Internet usage is up 4.2 percent, but like always, we're attributing it to XTube.

"A little more than a week after canceling a promising new out-of-home television audience measurement service due to concerns about the 'current economic environment,' Nielsen has canceled plans for its annual client meeting in 2009. The event, which was set to take place March 11-13 in Las Vegas, has grown to be something of a boondoggle in recent years–in which Nielsen wined, dined and entertained clients, and spent more time promoting its vision and new products than discussing serious methodological issues surrounding its measurement of media audiences. In an announcement sent to clients this afternoon, however, Nielsen implied that the economic concerns were more a function of its clients' fiscal situation than the Nielsen Company's." [MP]

Flawed audience measurement firm Nielsen is shutting down its social networking site Hey, Nielsen after more than a year of getting members to reveal personal information and viewing habits for free. Indeed, Nielsen is shuttering the one service that's both cost-effective and informative, so they can focus on more flawed, but wildly more profitable services. "Asked by one member, screen-named Cookieduster, if the members of Hey! Nielsen who selflessly volunteered their own personal information, preferences and insights for more than a year weren't 'owed a summary report of how our input was used (what research projects and for whom?) and what it might have meant,' Nielsen replied curtly, 'We cannot share any client details as this info is confidential. Your feedback has been very useful and we appreciate your participation.'" [MediaPost]

You always knew a device that let you fast-forward through commercials was too good to be true. The reason why shows like Gossip Girl have gotten so heavy-handed with their product placement ("Here Serena, try some of this delicious Vitamin Water while mulling over your relationship with Dan!") is because the coveted teen demographic are using DVRs to prerecord their programs and skip the commercials. Which is totally their right! But also, it's hurting The CW's Nielsen numbers. Except! New "delayed viewing" ratings are out, and it shows more people are watching The CW than previously thought. But! Those viewers are probably skipping ahead 30 seconds at a time. And!:

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"A Nielsen snafu in measuring viewers for The Weather Channel and Fuse has resulted in the delay of some cable ratings, including the scheduled release of third-quarter numbers set for Tuesday. Nielsen apologized for “recent errors in our Cable Dailies processing” for Saturday through Monday in a client memo Tuesday. As a result, the ratings firm said its audience estimates for Saturday, Sept. 27, won’t be available until the end of today, Tuesday." [MCN, earlier]

Nielsen, the Big Brother-esque media group that measures television consumption, is currently asking panel members to carry around teeny-tiny audio devices that react to "digital signals of audio media" to measure the amount of television being watched outside the home.

What does this mean for you? Once these numbers come out, Nielsen, which is responsible for all media ratings (when's the last time someone cited TNS' numbers?), will be able to tell you how much television we're sneaking in when away from our living rooms. The hours you waste watching Adult Swim at the office on your MacBook? Suddenly quantifiable!

And of course, you know what network whines all the time about not being able to accurately determine their viewership:

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Nielsen, the company prone to internal bickering and a gross inability to accurately measure television ratings, is finally getting on board with the most obvious of ideas: Use set-top devices, like cable boxes, to collect viewership data. Already, competitor TNS is making forays into this arena, which common sense would suggest provides the most accurate data, since set-top boxes can tell what channel a household is viewing, for how long, and when they change the channel. Previously, Nielsen relied on human beings to report this information. There is one nasty little problem, though: set-top boxes won't include all TV viewers, and it's hard to tie audience demographics to the data. This could be made easy if cable operators, so readily inclined to increase your monthly fees each month, actually admitted they don't care about your privacy much, and began anonymously tying your demographic data to viewership collection. Yes, there would be some legal hurdles here, but we're talking about a business model that determines how tens of billions of advertising dollars are spent each year. Figure it out.

Now we'll know exactly how many times Starbucks gets plugged during Weeds or Staples during The Office. Because somebody is going to start counting up all curious examples of fictional characters interacting with real brands! Sadly, the company doing the counting is audience metrics firm Nielsen, so expect egregious errors in any tallies over 10.

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It's certainly not our personal mission to make Google a cause célèbre, but we have a special place in our hearts for any company that challenges Nielsen Media Research, the bumbling audience analytics firm headed toward further catastrophe by David Calhoun, the former General Electric vice chairman. Google recently unveiled Google Ad Planner, a new framework that combines website metrics with media buying, which is supposed to replace the guesswork employed by companies like Nielsen and comScore, which use a complicated and mostly flawed mixture of audience panels and computer logging to tell clients how many people visit a website, and what type of people they are. Google, which collects metrics data itself, directly from websites that carry its tracking code, wants to challenge these industry leaders in a market they've long owned, and which media buyers have always had to rely on to know where best to spend their millions in ad buys. Except now that the service has debuted and the biggest media agencies have had a look, it appears Nielsen isn't in much danger of no longer holding clients hostage.

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… the ad unit isn't going anywhere. At 55 percent of all TV ad units, it still remains the go-to format, according to information-contriver Nielsen. Also: "Nielsen Co. says when viewers watch ads in prime time, the majority of messaging still comes in this tried-and-true package." Which is sort of like saying: "When young people write letters and send them by snail mail, the majority of those notes are still written with Bic pens."

Picking up from last week: The CW "has lost about 28 percent of its target audience of 18 to 34 year olds so far this season. Its ratings during this month's 'sweeps' period — the all-important measure upon which future advertising rates are set — are down about 22 percent." That is, um, very bad news.

It's also a chance for the network's brass to deflect accusations that its numbers are pitiful. Rather, it's the guys creating those numbers that have things wrong. Yes, when the reports are bad, blame Nielsen. We do!

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Nielsen continues its strategy of "buy the competition, don't make a better product" by completing the $225 million purchase of IAG Research, the "consumer-engagement" firm. [B&C]

Nielsen, the fumbling audience measurement company notorious for snapping up the competition instead of building a better product for market, is doing the print industry a favor and promising not to get involved in measuring its audience. Even though its new "anywhere/anytime" initiative promised to be able to measure all media consumption, David Calhoun's band of incompetents won't be treading on FAS-FAX territory.

Not only that: Nielsen is looking to get out of print entirely.

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"In the weeks leading up to this prelude to the upfront advertising marketplace, the Media Rating Council quietly met, reviewed a crucial audit of Nielsen's so-called C3 ratings system, and opted to withhold accreditation for what will be the currency for billions of dollars in TV advertising buys."

Confused? Allow us to explain. You know those upfront presentations all the networks are hosting to solicit ad buys for the upcoming television season? Those billion dollar deals are based on Nielsen data that hasn't passed muster for the second year in a row.

And then it gets worse.

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IT'S FUNNY BECAUSE IT'S TRUE Nielsen chief David Calhoun on innovation as a value: "We are still far off. We still have lots to do internally before we move to innovation." [PC]

TNS, the London-based audience measurement firm that, along with TiVo, has provided the only real competition for giant Nielsen, just rejected a $1.87 billion buyout offer from WPP Group, owner of, among other things, the media and advertising agencies MindShare, Mediaedge:cia, MediaCom, Maxus, JWT, Ogilvy & Mather, and Y&R. TNS's decision to refuse the buyout, because they viewed it as a lowball offer, quickly prompted rumors that Nielsen was preparing its own offer, which would take yet another competitive player off the market. Sound familiar?

Do you ever get the feeling that Nielsen launches new business units as an excuse to issue press releases, which get picked up by the industry trades, and gives the company a rosier outlook than one might otherwise afford the unstable giant? [Mediapost]

Bet you thought local television networks decided which dates they were going to pull various stunts to draw in viewership spikes so they could charge more for 30 second spots than they should reasonably be allowed?

Not so! That's the call of Nielsen, the audience measurement company that's turned its near monopoly on viewer stats into an excuse to barely do its job.

Since time immemorial-ish, Nielsen has put one of its four-time-a-year sweeps weeks in February; the others come in November (beginning of fall TV season), May (end of fall TV season), and July (previously the death bed of primetime, now the summer reality TV season). But with the federal mandate to switch from analog to digital broadcasts by Feb. 19 of next year, Nielsen doesn't want to trip up any homes who might not make the switch in time, leaving them WITHOUT TELEVISION ACCESS OMG.

So they're moving February sweeps. To March. Now watch the Super Bowl and Academy Awards get all nervous and move their stunts to March, too.