Special Announcement

Special announcement:

We are Margie and Edna. We have lived in Jericho, Kansas all our lives but we've decided it's time for us to branch out beyond our beloved town.

We'll still keep you informed of all the gossip-I mean the goings on here in town-but we're also going to talk about anything and everything else.

Please visit us at our new blog: Margie and Edna's Basement.

We do love having company.



"Fox passed CBS as the most-watched television network after its "American Idol" singing contest topped ratings and the Hollywood writers strike limited competition from scripted shows.

Fox's 6.8 rating among U.S. households in primetime for the season through March 16 snatched the lead from CBS Corp., according to Nielsen Media Research. CBS has been first for five consecutive seasons, Nielsen spokesman Gary Holmes said."

Nutty Nielsens

More on Nutty Nielsen ratings.

"Nielsen recently announced time frames for two major data initiatives, including a new "enhanced weighting" procedure that has the potential of generating differences in ratings estimates effective with the next television season. Nielsen said it will revise the algorithms it uses to weight national ratings beginning in September 2008, and that the revision would likely have an effect on both program and average commercial minute audience estimates."
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"Nielsen's calculation systems are so complex, especially since they've weighted people in the database so that a person is not a simple person. A person is 1.1 on one day and 1.5 on another day," Brooks explains, adding, "Therefore, when they do multiple calculations they run the risk that people who were heavily weighted in the 'live' sample, may not be in the playback sample."

Nielsen Out-Of-Home

"The Nielsen Co. has begun to get some traction for its newest research services that are designed to analyze TV viewing beyond the traditional home-bound TV screen. In a first-of-its kind agreement announced Thursday, Zenith Media Services has signed for three new Nielsen services, becoming the first subscriber to the Nielsen Out-of-Home Report.

Set to launch next month, the Out-of-Home Report is a joint service of Nielsen and Integrated Media Measurement that uses a cell phone-based methodology to track TV viewing outside the home in bars, hotels, airports and other locations. "




"Most Lost fans have a favorite character, or even a few favorites. Now all of the Locke fans, Kate admirers, and Ben disciples can settle their differences--March Madness-style. Since March 7th, the Washington Post has been hosting Lost Madness, a bracket-like poll to determine the best all-time Lost character."

Charter Goes Nielsen

"The Nielsen Co. has struck a deal with Charter Communications to analyze set-top box data from 330,000 homes in the Los Angeles area, the parties said today.

Nielsen has similar agreements with other undisclosed MSOs but the Charter deal goes a step further in that it licenses the ratings company to also create ratings reports from the data that it can then sell to clients. Nielsen said such reports would be available to clients starting in the second quarter of 2008. Adweek is a unit of Nielsen.

Charter struck a similar deal in November 2006 with Nielsen competitor TNS Media Research, which sells reports based on the Charter set-top box data to clients via a syndicated package it calls TotalView. Publicis Groupe's Starcom was the first media agency to sign up and other buyers and sellers of TV time have signed up since then.

Set-top box viewing data has attracted a lot of interest from agencies and their clients who are looking for more detailed analyses about the TV viewing patterns of the consumers they reach with ads. Set-top box data has the potential to offer more detail because it offers a second-by-second look at how viewers watch, as opposed to the minute-by-minute view offered by the current Nielsen national ratings service."

Nielsen Monopoly and Sampling

""The digital set-top box represents the Holy Grail for marketers; a virtual treasure-trove of TV viewing data -- if it can be effectively harnessed.

It could also mean the end of Nielsen Media Research's monopoly over the $600 million TV ratings business, if TNS, Comscore, ErinMedia or a host of other startups have their way.

An example of that is the skirmishes with Florida-based ErinMedia, which has developed technology it believes will make the concept of a "Nielsen Family" obsolete.

The company is in the middle of an antitrust suit against Nielsen in which it argues Nielsen's longterm, staggered contracts with media companies prevents others from entering the ratings market."
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"Mistakes in Sampling
And there are mistakes. Mistakes that have forced advertisers to lose money. Nielsen has acknowledged, for example, that in Los Angeles that fault rates for Hispanic households have been 27% higher than the rest of the sample. Audits by the Media Rating Council also found that Nielsen’s local people meter system used in New York failed to record viewing data from over 25% of African American homes in the sample.

I have only come across three people who were invited to be a part of the Nielsen family through People Meters and diaries used during sweeps period. All three admitted that with their busy schedules and viewing patterns it was hard to know what they actually watched. In addition, they often forgot to write down what they watched and decided to simply fill in the blanks with their favorites. One couple with a People Meter was on vacation and kept their television on PBS during their whole vacation in hopes of helping the non-commercial station.

In an effort to please advertisers and critics, Nielsen has been doing a few things that it believes are making them a little smarter. While its efforts can be applauded, some of the steps remained flawed."

Jericho Streaming

New Jericho Photos



The Veoh.com site is used by more than 23 million viewers per month. It allows viewers to watch streaming web video from across the Web. Jericho included.




"But now that Nielsen wants households to let it eavesdrop on many more activities — from Web surfing to cellphone use — how far will people open their doors?

In one potential setback to its ambitious modernization plan, Nielsen last year ran tests to determine the willingness of its television-monitoring households to allow electronic tracking of a second behavior, Web usage. So many people said no because of privacy concerns that Nielsen said this month it would scale back the plan — for now, at least — making the Web tracking optional."

Jericho: The Underrated

"I think that if CBS doesn’t pick Jericho up for a 3rd season, they’ll be making a terrible mistake. Everyone knows that Jericho is a fantastic underrated show. By now everyone understands that the Rating system is completely flawed and overrated, no pun intended."



"The price of a TV commercial routinely runs into the tens to hundreds of thousands of dollars. And if that wasn't enough, the three oldest broadcast-TV networks have for decades required another fistful of cash known as an "integration fee." Two big ad-industry trade groups are now fighting to keep that money in advertisers' coffers."



"Will couch potatoes give up their ability to skip ads if they can watch a program at a time of their own choosing? ABC is making its best-known programs available to media distributors who can promise exactly that, prompting a hot debate over whether advertisers should follow."

CBS: The Unwatched

"While CBS still constantly pitches itself on-air as the most-watched television network, that is no longer the case, at least not in prime-time where advertising dollars go for a premium.

Also worth noting is a very unhealthy longer-term trend for all the big guys (ABC, CBS, FOX and NBC) where there are appreciably more 35-49 viewers than there are 18-34 viewers. The youth seems to be phasing out of TV, and while that can somewhat be masked in the overall 18-49 and 25-54 categories, it won’t get masked forever."



"Earlier talks this year can only help the broadcast networks, who likely are going to have fewer new fall programs to tout due to the recently ended writers strike holding up production schedules and pilot development. The big TV outlets have other problems, too: their prime-time ratings continue to erode and penetration of ad-skipping digital video recorders continues to increase.

That's led to a growing sense among major advertisers that TV commercials don't work as well as they once did. A survey of 78 leading marketers conducted by the Association of National Advertisers and Forrester Research found 62% of marketers believe traditional TV ads have become less effective during the last two years. More than 50% reported that when half of all TV households use DVRs, they will cut spending on TV advertising 12%."

Jericho: Weekly Recap

Nielsen ratings


CBS: Know Your Audience


Count All Viewers


Exclusive interview with Bjo Trimble who is responsible for saving Star Trek.



Jericho Advertisers Contact List

Please Contact these advertisers and thank them - let them know you enjoy their product or are now interested.

Jericho Fans: Not At Fault

I am very aggravated by the articles that are coming out every day that seem to imply that Jericho fans are somehow at fault for the bad ratings. Can't these people read? Do they ever venture out from their blog? Like this comment:

"Well, you Jericho fans out there can’t say CBS didn’t give your show a chance. Networks rarely uncancel a show as it is, but they did it with Jericho after fans got riled up enough to engage in a brilliant resurrection campaign, but apparently all the publicity from that didn’t generate enough viewers, because Jericho’s Season 2 return from the abyss, starting with its first two episodes, netted well below average numbers."

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I beg to differ. CBS has never given Jericho a chance. There was the long hiatus, lack of advertising,summer reruns that were constantly being preempted, and affiliates who replaced Jericho with other programs. Many affiliates did not air the episode last Saturday night.

Furthermore, CBS told us to get viewers. Thanks for telling us to get viewers who don't count unless they're Nielsen families. Let me get my list of all those families that we don't know who they are. Thanks for never giving us any marketing help.

Are Jericho numbers below average? Compared to what? All the strike did was chase off viewers and some have never returned. Ratings are down all around us.

Joe says it best when he writes:
"If last season’s “Save Jericho” campaign taught them anything it was that this show has an audience, a damned vocal and clever one at that. Connecting to that audience is CBS’s job. In other words, each Tuesday night all of those hardcore Jericho fans are tuning in (to the tune of about 5 million). CBS needs to grow that audience. Too bad they’re not doing it."




Even Kelly Kahl of CBS says he realizes audiences are down so Jericho's ratings cannot be compared to last year's. What will CBS do now?


" Once the networks are back it remains to be seen whether viewers will be back as well. Expectations of audiences flocking to rare instances of original programming during the months-long strike proved incorrect. This year's Grammy Awards broadcast, after receiving a waiver from the Writers Guild of America, went on as usual in the teeth of the strike but got one of its smallest audiences on record. Likewise, there was much speculation "American Idol" would do its biggest numbers ever, based entirely on the fact there would be so few viewing alternatives. Instead, while far and away the most watched show on television this season, "Idol" is down this year from last.

"The real interesting thing when we get back up is what [viewing] levels are going to be at," Kahl said. "Are viewers going to come back, or will there be a strike hangover here?"

Jericho: CBS Boneheads

From Rich at Copywrite Ink comes hopeful news for all of who love our TV shows.


"According to The New York Times, NBC will be committing to a new lineup of shows earlier than any of its competitors, while also inviting advertisers to build marketing plans around specific shows and perhaps to integrate brands and products into the plots of the shows themselves.

The departure places a real question mark on the viability and importance of the Nielsen rating system. Nielsen is not prepared to measure a 52-week season; the bulk of its measure is based on traditional sweeps. Tradition, it seems, is dead.

Whether this decision plays well for the fans of recently cancelled shows, or those on the bubble, has yet to be seen. For NBC, the show is Journeyman. So far, despite the inventive Rice-A-Roni campaign, the best outcome for fans seems to be based on a rumor that a few more episodes of season one might see the light of day.

For CBS, everyone knows the show is Jericho. With season 2, episode 2 ratings being called a virtual disaster, even sympathetic critics seem to think there is little hope left."



"Nope, pin the responsibility for Jericho’s failure on CBS’s boneheaded scheduling and marketing. Putting this show right after a show that’s been dead for 5 years was a brilliant move if you’re trying to open up some space for yet another CSI. Otherwise, it’s a drain.

Look, I’m as thankful as anyone that CBS gave this show another chance. But what I don’t get is why they’re only giving it half of one.

If last season’s “Save Jericho” campaign taught them anything it was that this show has an audience, a damned vocal and clever one at that. Connecting to that audience is CBS’s job. In other words, each Tuesday night all of those hardcore Jericho fans are tuning in (to the tune of about 5 million). CBS needs to grow that audience. Too bad they’re not doing it."

Another Nielsen Error

Here's a concern for all of us. This is what recently happened in Ireland regarding a Nielsen error.
Just one more thing that worries me about networks depending on Nielsen.

"The company that compiles statistics on television viewing has made a serious error with its calculations, costing some TV stations hundreds of thousands of euro in lost revenue.

Channel 6 is threatening legal action over the mistake by AGB Nielsen, claiming it has lost €400,000 in advertising revenue because of the ongoing error. An independent auditor is being appointed to investigate how the mistake - which is to do with the weighting of Dublin audiences in its data - was made."

Jericho: Whack -The -Mole

Remember how Jericho fans showed CBS that they were not being counted by Nielsen ratings? We told CBS that everybody should be counted. Well, Nielsen made a little stab at it but nothing much has changed.

Now Nielsen has a plan to track how many people are watching a TV show via computer.Don't get excited though. This plan won't be introduced until the end of this year. Notice I said introduced and not implemented.


"Last year, when Nielsen came under fire by the fans of several cancelled television shows, I had some faith they could fix it," says Richard Becker of Copywrite Ink.

"Nowadays, it seems more that they are playing whack-the-mole. There is no clear focus. They have to fix the rating system that drive entertainment decisions before they can hope to provide better analytics for something a simple Google program or StatCounter can do."


Thanks Rich. Whack-the-mole seems to fit well here.

Nielsen: Too Little, Too Late

" In a sign that viewers are growing more interested in watching television shows on their computers, The Nielsen Co. will begin measuring TV viewing on PCs by the end of the year in its people meter household panels, the company said.

The effort is part of a broader plan to measure television viewing on mobile devices such as iPods and cell phones, according to the audience measurement company."

********What about now? Don't cancel any shows until then. Count everybody.*******



Midori Miller: One Voice At A Time

Such a sweet lady who loves Jericho



Send a Valentine from Lost, Ugly Betty, or Grey's Anatomy.

CBS,NBC,and Content

"Oh, I love my vampire!" CBS President of Entertainment Nina Tassler said recently, beginning a conversation about her network's new drama, "Moonlight."

Clearly, she must. No other TV show this fall has experienced as much turbulence as "Moonlight." But through all of the changes in the executive producing ranks, the cast and the show's framework, CBS hasn't budged in its support, scheduling it in between its reliable Friday-night fare, "Ghost Whisperer" and "Numb3rs."



Hey Nielsen Interviews JerichoMonster:

"In addition to being vocal and viral champions for their favorite show, the Jericho Monster crew have also proven themselves to be great community builders and a resource of information on TV and entertainment across the board. At a conference just last week on Consumer Generated Media hosted by our siblings at Nielsen Online, more than one TV exec spoke about the power of fan blogs and forums... and how they had all learned something from their passion and their approach."


"Beth Comstock, president of NBC Universal Integrated Media, told American Magazine Conference attendees today that we now spend more time with media than we spend sleeping.

Digital video recorders, the source of the most anxiety for companies like NBC Universal have only reached 22% penetration, according to NBC's research. But of course that number is growing rapidly. "It's causing a lot of anxiety in our world," she said.

This all reflects the many, many quick changes affecting the media business, but that's all right, she said, calling this a "golden age" of media. "It's a great thing to be a content company in the digital age," she said. "Content is always going to win."

DVR's and TV Ratings

Five freshman drama series -- NBC's "Bionic Woman," "Life," "Journeyman," "Chuck" and CBS' "Cane" -- have received orders for additional scripts.




"You knew it would happen: DVRs are finally breaking down the TV ratings system.

Because DVRs make skipping over commercials so easy, Nielsen is now rating commercials themselves, based in part on how often people stop fast-forwarding and watch them. According to a New York Times report, DVRs have also affected show ratings themselves: after a single night, a show like How I Met Your Mother might have a 2.7, but by the end of the week, when everyone with a DVR has watched it, the rating might be much higher, at 4.1. The trouble is, both of these new ratings take weeks to process."



Here's a new Jericho blog with a unique twist.

Check it out here.

Writer's Strike: Will It Help Jericho ?

Interesting article with a lot of details:

"A real TV writers’ strike could mean interesting drama in the advertising sales offices of broadcast networks — as if this ad market hasn’t been theatrical enough.

In theory, marketers could make networks redo all their upfront deals, says one media agency executive. Why? Because they paid for original network programming - not for reruns, or some half-baked reality shows, or some not-fleshed-out backburner scripted shows."


Nielsen Reverses Rule on Rebroadcast Ratings

"Nielsen is eliminating a new rule that was intended to help advertisers better track how many people watched a TV show and their ads no matter when they watched it. But outcry over the way NBC used the policy to report ratings for the season debut of its hit "Heroes" has scuttled the effort -- at least for now.

The ensuing brouhaha illustrates some of the troubles in measuring TV audiences who are able to use new technology to view programs in new and different ways. More viewers are using digital video recorders to watch their favorite programs hours or days after their original broadcast; downloading episodes from iTunes or Amazon; and watching streaming episodes of the programs online. Networks, recognizing that not all the fans of a show are able to watch it the night it originally airs, have begun to schedule encore episodes (often on Friday or Saturday nights) as a way to give more people a chance to see the episode. As this trend develops, the true total number of viewers of a particular episode comes not only from measuring a traditional TV audience."



"The debut of the CBS reality show “Survivor: China” delivered 15 million viewers on Sept. 20. In an indication of how important digital video recorder playback is becoming, it gained another 2.1 million DVR viewers within one week of the premiere.

DVR playback data for the first week of the fall television season will be released next week."

Jericho: Mysterious Nielsen's

"Nielsen Media Research has long been that sleepy and mysterious enterprise -- occasionally vilified, frequently cajoled and periodically challenged by would-be competitors -- whose findings determine whether TV shows live or die.

Lately, however, the company has roused itself to pursue grander ambitions, just at the point where exploding media options and the hunger for easily digestible data suggest the TV industry might benefit if Nielsen stuck to its knitting."




"In an age of instant statistical gratification, network execs are discovering that patience is now much more than a virtue -- it's a fact of life.

While box office prognosticators these days can hazard a reliable guess as to a pic's perf after just one or two East Coast showings, TV's rapidly evolving distribution landscape is increasingly turning the ratings race into something of a guessing (and waiting) game.

New viewing options such as DVRs, streaming videos and instant downloads that allow auds to watch shows on their own timetable are making it harder than ever to figure out just how many people are tuning in to a show -- particularly new series. And it has become easier than ever for nets to spin Nielsen numbers and hide behind more marginally performing shows."





"Because commercial-minute ratings don't mean much to the average viewer, Nielsen and the networks still are paying attention to program ratings. Those numbers give the earliest determination of whether a show is doing well, which is crucial for a lot of reasons, not the least of which is the public relations battle the networks always fight."

Jericho, Sprague, and TvBigShot

"What would you think about an online "fantasy" game that offered $100,000 cash to the person who could best predict which shows the Nielsen households would watch over a nine-month period? Would you have a problem with it, if Nielsen household members -- or even Nielsen employees -- could play and win?

What if the rules of this game provided an incentive for Nielsen members who are enrolled in the game to watch broadcast TV shows instead of cable TV shows? And what if, in order to get really good at the game, Nielsen members would peruse and learn about dozens of network-only TV shows, many of which they would not have otherwise known about, while not being exposed to a single cable TV show?

Well, folks, such a game exists. It's called TVBigShot, and the game is sponsored by NBC Universal and the Bravo Company. The motto at the top of the Web site? "Spare the Snark, Spoil the Networks." Over 16,300 people have already subscribed, and the game is designed to attract people who are passionate about TV and TV ratings. I think this game will draw Nielsen members like moths to a cathode ray tube."



Sprague Grayden says it's Jericho fans against the world.

"She also believes its time to re-evaluate the Nielsen Ratings system, believes "Jericho" leading lady Sprague Grayden -- after seeing thousands of "Jericho" fans create the campaign that caused CBS to reverse the show's cancellation. "Obviously, 'Jericho' is doing well on the Internet or TiVo, but there's no way to rate that. I think it happens to a lot of shows. This whole TiVo situation is a problem," she says."


"Who knew a post-apocalyptic world could be so beautiful?
Jericho Season 1"


"How brave of CBS to be one of the first networks to say, 'You know what? We need to revisit this. We need to find a new way to define how successful a show is.'" She continues, "The fact that our producers are so open-minded and are saying, 'Sure, I'll listen' -- that never happens. We're all kind of in it together now. It's not just 'Jericho' versus CBS or other shows. It's now 'Jericho' and our fans kind of versus the world."

Nielsen Numbers

"All TV: New Nielsen measurement changes the numbers game"

"It will be a game-changer, but it will not be a significant game-changer," said Melva Benoit, Fox's senior VP of research. "DVRs have doubled in penetration, and Nielsen's finally caught up to have more DVRs in the sample. We'll see some changes in some shows that narrowly fit the profile, but it's unlikely that a number 15 show (under the traditional measurement) would crack the top 10 (factoring in Live Plus Seven), for instance."



Many thanks to Kystorms who let Margie and Edna visit her blog. Check it out here.



Looking For Jericho Soon?

"Anybody up for a little "Jericho"? Like, say, just in time for Thanksgiving?"



"Playback" payback: Nielsen ratings to include DVR viewings"