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showAuth({"version":"1.0","encoding":"UTF-8","entry":{"xmlns":"http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom","xmlns$blogger":"http://schemas.google.com/blogger/2008","xmlns$georss":"http://www.georss.org/georss","xmlns$gd":"http://schemas.google.com/g/2005","xmlns$thr":"http://purl.org/syndication/thread/1.0","id":{"$t":"tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-708938817000327103.post-5543217577254530026"},"published":{"$t":"2013-06-20T21:04:00.000+09:30"},"updated":{"$t":"2015-07-23T00:21:30.615+09:30"},"category":[{"scheme":"http://www.blogger.com/atom/ns#","term":"Columns"}],"title":{"type":"text","$t":""},"content":{"type":"html","$t":"\u003Cdiv class=\"separator\" style=\"clear: both; text-align: center;\"\u003E\n\u003Ca href=\"http:\/\/4.bp.blogspot.com\/-vtZHyBNbL9w\/UrLm1dvRP8I\/AAAAAAAAA0E\/dNg05cFgKIM\/s1600\/port-col-tvratings.jpg\" imageanchor=\"1\" style=\"margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;\"\u003E\u003Cimg border=\"0\" src=\"http:\/\/4.bp.blogspot.com\/-vtZHyBNbL9w\/UrLm1dvRP8I\/AAAAAAAAA0E\/dNg05cFgKIM\/s1600\/port-col-tvratings.jpg\" \/\u003E\u003C\/a\u003E\u003C\/div\u003E\n\u003Cbr \/\u003E\nYOU know that parlour game where you nominate all the people, living or dead, you’d most like to invite to a dinner party? People usually say things like Nelson Mandela, or Mick Jagger, or Einstein, or, if you’re most of the blokes I know, Miranda Kerr (I suppose she wouldn’t eat much, so you’d save money on prep).\u003Cbr \/\u003E\n\u003Cbr \/\u003E\nNot me. I’m not interested in dining with supermodels and rock stars.\u003Cbr \/\u003E\n\u003Cbr \/\u003E\nActually that’s a big lie. I definitely am (just in case there are any reading this who would like to extend an invitation), but for the purposes of this next part of the column let’s pretend I’m not. Because actually the people I’d most like to have round for a meal are the anonymous hordes recruited by Nielsen’s OzTAM service to provide our national television ratings.\u003Cbr \/\u003E\n\u003Ca name='more'\u003E\u003C\/a\u003EThere are a few thousand of them so it’d have to be a big meal – maybe a couple of lambs on the spit – but it’d be worth it, just so I could sit them all down and say, ‘‘Who ARE you people and why are you ruining TV for the rest of us?’’\u003Cbr \/\u003E\n\u003Cbr \/\u003E\nBecause when it comes down to it, it’s this group of people – from about three thousand homes across Adelaide, Sydney, Brisbane, Melbourne and Perth, and about two thousand in regional areas – that determines which shows are ‘‘popular’’ every night and, by consequence, which get renewed and which get\u003Cbr \/\u003E\ncanned.\u003Cbr \/\u003E\n\u003Cbr \/\u003E\nBasically, it’s their fault we’re being subjected to yet another series of \u003Ci\u003EMasterChef\u003C\/i\u003E, while brilliant dramas like \u003Ci\u003EThe Americans\u003C\/i\u003E and \u003Ci\u003EHannibal \u003C\/i\u003Eget pushed further and further back in the nightly schedule.\u003Cbr \/\u003E\n\u003Cbr \/\u003E\nThanks to a little magic box installed on their televisions, Neilsen can tell what shows these people are watching and when, data which it then extrapolates into ‘‘viewing estimates’’ which the networks then either trumpet triumphantly or attempt to bury.\u003Cbr \/\u003E\n\u003Cbr \/\u003E\nNow I realise there’s probably more complicated maths going into these calculations than my decidedly non-numeric brain can comprehend, but I can’t help feeling puzzled that our ratings are based on just 0.02 per cent of the population.\u003Cbr \/\u003E\n\u003Cbr \/\u003E\nI’m not saying the statistics aren’t accurate – the industry accepts they are. But when all I hear about every\u003Cbr \/\u003E\nWednesday is what happened on \u003Ci\u003EGame of Thrones\u003C\/i\u003E the previous night, yet the official OzTAM ratings say the most watched program was \u003Ci\u003EThe Block Sky High\u003C\/i\u003E, I scratch my head a bit.\u003Cbr \/\u003E\n\u003Cbr \/\u003E\nBecause here’s the thing: The other week I bought my own ‘‘magic box’’.\u003Cbr \/\u003E\n\u003Cbr \/\u003E\nLike the Nielsen boxes it plugs into my telly, but it doesn’t measure broadcast television like they do – quite\u003Cbr \/\u003E\nthe opposite. It actually subverts that whole system by allowing me to stream shows direct from the internet.\u003Cbr \/\u003E\n\u003Cbr \/\u003E\nThese days I’m less likely to tune into a show when it airs on TV than I am to fire up my little device and watch it a week or even several weeks later on a ‘‘catch-up’’ webTV service.\u003Cbr \/\u003E\n\u003Cbr \/\u003E\nLike all those \u003Ci\u003EGame of Thrones\u003C\/i\u003E fans,more than a million of whom downloaded the show’s final episode last\u003Cbr \/\u003E\nweek, I’m more likely to watch programs I’ve gotten off the internet as our free-to-air networks have canned or decided to ignore them.\u003Cbr \/\u003E\n\u003Cbr \/\u003E\nWhile Nielsen’s American branch has announced it will soon start including internet ‘‘streaming figures’’ in its\u003Cbr \/\u003E\nratings estimates, OzTAM is still somewhat on the fence saying it is ‘‘investigating’’ this option.\u003Cbr \/\u003E\n\u003Cbr \/\u003E\nUltimately it all comes down to advertising – ratings means dollars for the networks, and it’s much harder to quantify that in an online environment.\u003Cbr \/\u003E\n\u003Cbr \/\u003E\nBut with more people now watching TV content on their laptop, tablet and smartphones, our ratings system is going to have to change if it’s going to remain an accurate reflection of Australians’ viewing habits.\u003Cbr \/\u003E\n\u003Cbr \/\u003E\n\u003Ci\u003EFirst published in The Advertiser, June 20, 2013.\u003C\/i\u003E"},"link":[{"rel":"edit","type":"application/atom+xml","href":"http:\/\/www.blogger.com\/feeds\/708938817000327103\/posts\/default\/5543217577254530026"},{"rel":"self","type":"application/atom+xml","href":"http:\/\/www.blogger.com\/feeds\/708938817000327103\/posts\/default\/5543217577254530026"},{"rel":"alternate","type":"text/html","href":"http:\/\/www.petrastarke.com\/2000\/11\/you-know-that-parlour-game-where-you.html","title":""}],"author":[{"name":{"$t":"Unknown"},"email":{"$t":"noreply@blogger.com"},"gd$image":{"rel":"http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#thumbnail","width":"16","height":"16","src":"https:\/\/img1.blogblog.com\/img\/b16-rounded.gif"}}],"media$thumbnail":{"xmlns$media":"http://search.yahoo.com/mrss/","url":"http:\/\/4.bp.blogspot.com\/-vtZHyBNbL9w\/UrLm1dvRP8I\/AAAAAAAAA0E\/dNg05cFgKIM\/s72-c\/port-col-tvratings.jpg","height":"72","width":"72"}}});