DirecTV, TNS Partner for Largest National TV Audience Panel

DirecTV has struck a deal with TNS to provide a national TV household panel of 100,000 DirecTV homes or TNS’s census-based, digital set-top TV ratings business.

TNS plans to measure the total viewing, both live and time-shifted, of programs and commercials at a second-by-second level.

The deal creates the largest national TV audience measurement panel ever in the U.S., according to the companies. But while the panel may be the largest, the DirecTV data alone will not be enough for TNS to displace Nielsen, with which it competes, as the measurement king, writes Silicon Alley Insider. Nielsen’s sample comes from families across the entire country, while TNS’s data will come only from DirectTV’s 16.6 million subscribers, who skew rural and are concentrated in areas where cable service is weak.
Meanwhile, CBS has announced that it, too, will be looking at DVR viewer behavior on a second-by-second basis through a new deal with TiVo, reports TV Week.

The cable industry has apparently been working on its own measurement initiative, called Project Canoe, which is expected to be unveiled later this year, MediaPost writes.