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In Chicago, they ignored Michael Jordan.
On June 14, 1996, more than 2 million area viewers were tuned to NBC, hoping to see the Bulls capture the NBA championship in game 5 of the finals against the Seattle SuperSonics. As the Sonics pulled out an 89-78 win right at 11 p.m., the network announced it would air its postgame show on sister cable channel CNBC. It seemed a smart move: NBC Sports could continue its coverage while affiliates went to local news. But when the ratings arrived the next day, Peacock execs were scratching their heads. Nielsen Media Research reported that in Chicago CNBC had snagged a rating of zero. Nil. Nada. Zippo. ''How can that be?'' asks an exasperated Nicholas Schiavone, NBC senior VP of research. ''Zero audience to a Chicago Bulls postgame show? During the NBA finals? In Chicago? I mean, that makes no sense.''
And more important to the networks, no cents. For almost as long as television has kept America glued to the couch, Nielsen ratings have been its currency, measuring viewing audiences via an intricate system of ''tuning meters,'' ''people meters,'' and viewers' handwritten logs. But in the last four months, ABC, NBC, CBS, and Fox have been raging against the Nielsen machine, publicly complaining that the company is handing them distorted figures based on shoddy measurement methods -- and costing them, by one estimate, almost half a billion dollars annually in lost advertising revenue. While Nielsen denies it has any systemic problems -- on the contrary, it cites service improvements -- the majors are mad as hell, vowing not to take it anymore, and backing the threat with $40 million to develop a rival ratings service. ''Nielsen is composed of a bunch of Sluggos,'' Schiavone carps, ''and the only thing they'll respond to is a stick across the head.''
Thwack! The drubbing began in earnest Dec. 16, when the Big Four went public with a full-page ad in the Hollywood trades: ''Our confidence in Nielsen is Down.'' It was a direct retort to Nielsen's own Nov. 20 ad, ''Our service is Up,'' that celebrated an increase in the number of metered homes nationwide and ''record high cooperation'' from those households asked to join the national survey. The network response tarred Nielsen with five complaints that, translated from industry jargon, indict the company for surveying the wrong people, doing it incompletely, and then issuing fluctuating numbers that belie Nielsen's own local ratings.
Could it be? Is the only currency of this $46 billion business suspect? Nielsen maintains its biggest clients (who pay the company $10 million a year) are upset because they have so much to lose -- industry predominance -- and have been losing it at a steady clip for years, their ratings dropping like an anchor in the 500-channel sea. With February's sweeps complete, the company reports that network audiences have fallen 17 percent since 1995, and that 1.3 million Americans have stopped watching prime time altogether since last season. But don't blame the messengers -- they'll get sarcastic: ''If their numbers go down, it's Nielsen's fault,'' says Nielsen spokesman Jack Loftus. ''If their numbers go up, there's this eerie silence. Fox is running full-page ads saying that they're the number two network. They're not saying 'Something must be wrong with these numbers.'''
