How do I become a Nielsen rating household?

[bluestateguy]

I have just about had it with all of these "Nielsen" families who purport to represent the rest of us in America. I want to stand up and be counted too. Do my favorite shows get officially credited with one viewer when I tune in to watch? How on earth can these people claim that because a couple of thousand households with a bogus machine in their TV tuned in to a show that therefore "18 million people" watched CSI? Come on. 18 million ought to mean 18 million. I want to stand up and be counted for watching the shows that I watch so that they might stay on the air and not be drown out by an endless lineup of cop shows, courtroom dramas, hospital shows and "reality" shows . So where do I go, what do I do so that I too can have as much influence as the mindless Nielsen household morons who keep watching all the crummy shows that keep getting renewed, and renewed, and renewed...

[Pale Blue Dot]

1. I am one.

Or technically, I was one, until the divorce.

They pick you at random from a certain demographic area you represent (I'm guessing that mine was "white trash trying to act smarter").

Since I left the house, ratings for Nickolodeon, Cartoon Network, and "American Idol" have gone up. :puke:

[likesmountains 52]

2. you can't offer...they have to ask you. I have been one in the past

but as the other post says, I think they look for certain demographic/geographic qualities.

[Adenoid_Hynkel]

3. i was asked to do an arbitron survey once

then they suddenly told me i wasn't wanted-oddly, it was at the height of my activism against clear channel. perhaps that had something to do with it