Nielsen ratings and Twitter

Cassie

Touching the monolith
Staff member
http://www.uproxx.com/tv/2012/12/twitter-nielsen-social-buzz-rankings/

Starting in the fall of 2013, Twitter and the Nielsen will roll out a new ratings service designed to measure the popularity of a program based on the number of mentions on the social network. There’s no details yet on how exactly this service will work, but it’s being provided to “supplement” the existing, and archaic Nielsen ratings service. I do appreciate the fact that Nielsen is catching up to the fact that many of us are multi-screen viewers these days (the television set, plus an iPad/iPhone, which is often dialed in to Twitter or Facebook), but I’m not a huge fan of such a ratings service.

Why? Because Twitter has been notoriously unreliable in predicting the popularity of both television and movies. Some may remember, for instance, that two years ago, Scott Pilgrim vs. The World was HUGE on Twitter, trending for basically three straight days, in addition to a lot of Twitter chatter during Comic Con. Yet, it only mustered $10 million on that opening weekend, a huge disappointment for the studio. Twitter is kind of like Comic Con in its predictive value: It creates a lot of online buzz, but that buzz doesn’t often lead to actual box office or, in many cases, ratings. Twitter mentions are inordinately unrepresentative, capturing not only an unrepresentative cross section of America, but only the ones more likely to speak up (in my “real” life, I have maybe two friends that are on Twitter, and neither tweet regularly, and all those people are semi-regular television viewers, although — as is the growing trend — most of their viewing is on Netflix, and always a year behind).

Still, the real reason I’m most reluctant to get behind the service is purely selfish: It’s because basing a television’s show’s popularity — and thus its chances at being renewed or cancelled — on social media is NOT going to improve the outlook for many of our favorite shows. In fact, Mashable has ranked the 50 television shows with the MOST social buzz in 2012, and — in many cases — unless you’re a kid, a teenage girl, a shut-in, or a news junkie, the Social Buzz ratings are not going to be your friend. Based on total social activity, here are the top 25 shows

1. Spongebob Squarepants
2. The X-Factor
3. The Voice
4. Pretty Little Liars
5. Bad Girls Club
6. American Idol
7. Love & Hip Hop Atlanta
8. The Ellen Degeneres Show
9. Today
10. The Walking Dead
11. 106 & Park
12. Glee
13. Jersey Shore
14. The Vampire Diaries
15. The Simpsons
16. Piers Morgan Tonight
17. Good Morning America
18. Dancing with the Stars
19. Saturday Night Live
20. Big Bang Theory
21. Teen Wolf
22. Rugrats
23. NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams
24. Family Guy
25. Big Brother

(there's more in the article in the link, but I didn't want to post the whole thing, ok? :rwmad: )

So, I guess it's good that Nielsen is trying to update their system, but there are problems with using Twitter. For one thing, it would be super easy to game the system. Any fandom could take advantage of Twitter and cause anything to trend if they're really determined.
 

CaptainWacky

I want to smell dark matter
Yeah everytime I look at the treding topics it's ALWAYS Bieber/1 Direction/Taylor Swift/Miley so we shouldn't use it to judge ANYTHING really.

And Fall 2013 will be TOO LATE for Community anyway (that's what you were ALL THINKING.)
 

Eggs Mayonnaise

All In With The Nuts
It's also dumb because some reality shows ask the viewers to cast votes via Twitter, which isn't really "buzz" and falsely inflates the show's numbers.
 

Fuddlemiff

Is this real life?
No. I was thinking of Alphas.
 

Cassie

Touching the monolith
Staff member
Ryan Cartwright ‏@RyanCartwright

Deleted the #Alphas tweet. Was informed that they're still deliberating. Will reapply crossed fingers for a 3rd season. #AlphasS03!!!

Gary just tweeted that, but I missed the deleted tweet :rwmad: I think he tweeted that Alphas was canceled.
 

whisky

Boobie inspector
Bad idea.

Next shows will be renewed based on how many likes they get on facebook.
 

CaptainWacky

I want to smell dark matter
Does anyone talk about Alphas on Twitter?
 

Fuddlemiff

Is this real life?
Not really. Just the cast.

I'll make sure in on hand to comfort Ryan should the news be bad.
 

CaptainWacky

I want to smell dark matter
I'll "comfort" Laura Mennell (wank over her instagram pics.)
 

Cassie

Touching the monolith
Staff member
WHO WILL COMFORT ME? :rwmad:
 

CaptainWacky

I want to smell dark matter
COMFORTABLE TED is up for it.
 
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