My aunt and uncle had the device hooked to their TV. I’m surprised to hear about the diary. How often was it sent in? Or did you call it in? It seems like TV ratings have, at least in my lifetime, always been available within a day, so I can’t imagine how they process a bunch of handwritten logbooks so quickly.
I kept the book for a month. It had time slots for every day, broken into time periods. At the end of the month, I mailed it back. This was in the early 90’s. I don’t know how they do the overnight ratings. I guess they must use the devices.
I kept a diary in the early 90’s. It was really boring reading after filling in what TV shows I watched, or rather, had on (not necessarily watching, just background noise) that week, and seemed to me it wasn’t very reliable or scientific. No machine hooked up to the TV. They sent me a few crisp new dollar bills for my efforts, woo hoo!
Having been a Nielsen family the main reason that you don’t know any Nielsen families is that there are very few of them at any givien time and they are instructed not to broadcast the fact that they are one. So you may have known people who were participating who just never mentioned the fact.
And given that we were horrible about keeping up with pushing the button on the box and yet were consistantly praised by our rep as one of his most consistant homes did not speak well for what kind of accurate responses they actually get.
The $100 a month to do it was nice though! 
Plus, since they had to install the monitoring equipment on all the electronics, when I got my new home theater system the rep came in and set the whole thing up for me and paid me $25 per piece to do it 
I did the radio logbook once, too, in the mid-Nineties in a small Ohio town. I listened to NPR most of the time, so I doubt that was of much interest to them.
My parents, both in their 80’s, just completed and sent in their log book. Look for a big ratings jump for “Big Joe’s Super Polka Show” on RFD-TV. (That show’s a hoot, I tell ya.)
They got a dollar bill for participating.
I was a Nielsen household once, and admit to watching things that week I ordinarily wouldn’t have because they were things I would want to see on TV more (PBS stuff) and things I figured could use the “help”.
Never been asked again since.
I did the Nielson thing once, and I don’t remember having ever told a single person I did it – it simply wasn’t the kind of thing that came up in conversation. So it’s quite possible that you have rubbed elbows with people who have done it, and they just haven’t had occasion to tell you about it.
This. I was a diarist twice for Nielson. I fudged my numbers a bit, and listed shows watched that I liked but missed because I was doing something else. So you probably have known a number of Nielson families.
Nielson called me once. The questioning process did not go well. The race question always turns into a mess at my white/hispanic/middle eastern household. Then they asked what channels we get and I told them we just have the broadcast channels at my house. She seemed pretty surprised by that. I never heard from them again.
I had the diary once in the mid 80s. I think they sent a dollar bill for participating.
I kept a diary for them around 1988 or two times. They contacted me twice for some reason and so I did it, one right after the other. I believe that I got a whole whopping two dollars for my efforts.
I recall that there was a place to put things that were taped at the bottom of the page and I also believe that I wanted to make sure Star Trek TNG was watched so it would make it to the next season.
I just recently finished a week of keeping a Nielsen diary, from November 12 through November 19th.
I don’t watch much television but I faithfully and honestly wrote down what I did watch.
I’ve kept a two-week diary twice, and once I got a mini survey thing. I got 30 bucks last time I did the diary, which was pretty sweet. I think I got 3 bucks for the mini survey thing.
The first time I did the diary there was no place to account for shows watched on DVR, but the second time you could indicate that you recorded it and what time you actually watched it.
I kept a week-long (or was it two weeks?) television diary for Nielson in the mid-1990s. They sent me a pre-printed blank chart in a booklet, and I dutifully filled in the time slots with whatever I watched. A token payment of a dollar came with the booklet. After I returned the completed diary to Nielson, I got several letters from them asking me if I would please send the diary — meaning somewhere they lost mine. So, a waste of my time and theirs.
I was. I let them hook up a gadget to my tv, and i told them that i did not have cable and used my tv to watch movies. I also filled out a diary… and i used the $ to take myself to lunch and for some groceries.
I did back a few years ago, for radio.
If I got another request, I’d decline because of their offshoring announcement recently.
Its not the Nielson ratings, but rather, it is the “unemployment surveys” that nobody has ever been polled for.
This is simply not true. I spent over 15 years working with (but not for) Nielsen and they pride themselves on using sound mathematical statistical sampling.
They base who goes into their sample on the US Census data - so if the census says x% of the population reported in as male, then x% of their sample will be male. If y% of the population says they earn in a certain income bracket then y% of their sample will be there too… and so on and so forth. They say that they match up their sample as closely as possible to outside, trusted data sources so that any information extrapolated from their sample is correct, and their sample is large enough to be “statistically significant” (in other words, large enough so that variations are not exaggerated - in a tiny sample a person who has a unique characteristic is over represented percentage wise).
Note: I am not saying they are or are not accurate, I’m just reporting what they themselves claim.
We currently have the device. It’s another remote control that we have to fuss with when we watch something.
They send me a check for fifty bucks every so often, and we got a catalog of cheap free gifts. I got a watch for my wife.
My son is home for the next fifteen days, and he reconnected his plasma TV to his game system and we are back to watching the crappy one we have had for the last ten years or so. I wonder if the Nielsen people will notice.
I considered watching shows I want to encourage, but it’s too much bother. I told the guy that I didn’t watch much TV, and I don’t, but he didn’t care.
If I am indicative, Monk is the highest rated show in the US, and almost everything else beside boxing, WEC, and the “Cutting Edge” stuff on Comcast are dead last.
Regards,
Shodan