Need for Ratings.

"How many people were watching?" That question captivated (and still captivates) television executives and advertisers. To find the answer, television networks and individual stations began in the late 1940s to hire firms to do the surveys that determined program popularity and audience. With such information the networks and stations could determine what they might charge companies to advertise on particular shows.

History of Ratings.

The idea of audience testing was not new. The radio networks and individual stations had begun in 1930 to test the level of audiences by the use of telephone interviews. New techniques were then developed to improve the validity of survey results. The most important of these were the printed roster, in which listeners marked down on a preprinted list the programs they watched; the mechanical recorder; and the interview. While the radio-ratings service field was very...