DVR Having Significant Result in Ratings, Finally Being Calculated
Great article here in the NYTimes that covers how TV studios are having to seriously start evaluating how to distribute their show ratings in order to factor in DVR watching. It’s pretty impressive that some shows can have viewing spikes as high as 15-19%!! That’s amazing given the anticipation on some of these shows, but I think a lot of it goes to the fact that so much of the programming is on at the same time.
Browse around our forums and you can see a very vivid and active discussion surrounding a lot of these new show premieres. The beauty of a discussion like this is that it continues to evolve and change not because of new shows, but as our members continue catching up with all the shows their DVRs have caught. Real life sometimes gets in the way of watching even your favorite shows–I’m the perfect example of that, as I still have yet to watch one of my favorites’ premier, Dexter.
Other new
series also got significant boosts from the added viewing. CBS
looked like it had the biggest new hit of the season with the remake of
“Hawaii Five-O” and that was underscored by growth of 19 percent with
delayed viewing included. The show jumped from a 3.9 rating to a 4.7
rating. A new CBS comedy, “Mike and Molly,” increased from a 3.9 to a
4.3. The Fox comedy, “Raising Hope,” bounced up from a 3 rating to a
3.4.
I think this is a small step in the right direction as it did not look like the report included factoring online viewership. This is a bit odd given that NBC for example controls Hulu, so finding out the numbers data should be fairly easy. Maybe they wanted to focus strictly on traditional "TV" viewing…but I think this alone is a step in the right direction. Just think, this time last year the folks at Fox might have panicked with House’s initial ranking, but factoring the DVR crowd it’s clear the show is still prominent.
The humerous part of all this of course, is that DVR’s have been around for 10+ years. I wonder how many shows were cancelled due to poor initial ratings thanks to us DVR users?