As reported on Engadget.
By Richard Lawler
According to the Wall Street Journal, Nielsen’s TV ratings are about to get some company, with a system that covers internet watchers. A “Nielsen Digital Program Ratings” pilot program will debut with participation from NBC, Fox, ABC, Univision, Discovery and A&E, tracking the viewership of streaming video they post on their websites. AOL (parent company of Engadget) is also reported to be participating, as the networks compare the data to their internal statistics before the ratings system gets a wider rollout. Of course, even the system they’re testing will only jump so far into the future — while it will track viewing on computers, it’s still leaving out phones and tablets. Networks want to track anywhere content is viewed — one of the issues we’ve been told they have with tech like Aereo or TWC TV — to sell ads against it, we’ll wait for more details to see if they’ll have any success extending the current model to other types of screens.