But Nielsen does a better job at finding those shows where people watch the commercials. 10 Million could watch Firefly on TiVo, but if only 20,000 see commercials, I suspect it wouldn't last too long.
What good is a rating if it doesn't tell you anything about what you can charge for advertising? Ideally, TiVo will figure out how to give you a brief commercial during the fast-forward.
What evidence do you have of that?
At best you assume that people watching non TIVO don't do other things during commercials. (I know a good many of my friends get up and do things during commercials.) Also many folks tape programs with VCRs and fast forward through the commercials when the watch.
And Nielson is not tracking at all with the new ratings such as Tivo, DVR and On Demand/pay per view.
When Firefly was shown on Fox on Fridays it was one of the highest TIVOed shows on at the time, yet the Nielson ratings had it in the basement. Also when the DVD box set went on sale it rocketed to the number one spot on Amazon sales IT is currently Number 21 on their DVD top Sellers list. It ranks above Star Wars Boxed set and Harry Potter, Prisoner of Askaban, Desperate Housewives first season,The Soprano's 5th season and BSG 1st Season.
Clearly something is wrong when all other ways to track something are counter to the guestimates that Nielson puts up. And this is not only happened with Firefly but many other shows also. Family Guy is another and Futurama as well. Word is there is now supposedly and unofficial investigation into Nielson and a payola type scandal only they are supposed to have manufactured numbers and accepted payments to promote certain shows.