Media research: peoplemeters in the USA - the promise and the reality

A detailed history of the arrival of peoplemeters as the `measurement system of choice' for U.S. national television in 1986, and what has followed it.

Peoplemeters in the USA

- the promise and the reality

William S Rubens

What happened when the complex US television market discovered peoplemeters: the old audience measurement system's problems... Nielsen's lively response to the AGB interloper... then in 1990 'all hell broke loose'...

A colleague suggested I should have titled this paper, "The illusion vs the reality". No event has stirred the United States media research community as much as the introduction of peoplemeters as the 'measurement system of choice' for national television in 1986.

This paper will examine the role that audience measurements plays in the United States...

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