Nielsen CEO Testifies @ Senate Commerce Committee Hearing.

Nielsen Media Research President and CEO Susan D. Whiting testified before the Senate Commerce Committee’s Subcommittee on Communications regarding the introduction of its Local People Meter (LPM) ratings system. Sitting on a panel with several other industry executives, Ms. Whiting underscored Nielsen’s ongoing commitment to provide accurate and representative TV measurement data, and reaffirmed the company’s intention to proceed with the LPM launch in the face of a well-financed campaign of misinformation designed to discredit the service.

Ms. Whiting said that Nielsen “will continue to listen to and work with all interested parties to ensure our measurements fully and fairly represents all television viewers. And we will stand firmly in defending an independent, objective and accurate ratings service in which everyone counts.”

“Most important,” added Ms. Whiting, ” we will continue to resist all attempts to manipulate this process to mislead the public through a campaign that has nothing to do with protecting the rights of African Americans, Latinos or any other ethnic group, and everything to do with protecting the commercial self-interest of specific media companies.”

In her opening remarks before the Communications Subcommittee, Ms. Whiting said that the Local People Meter system relies on the same advanced technology that Nielsen has been using since 1987 in its national TV ratings. The company has been introducing the LPM service into major markets since 2002 at the urging of clients who demand the same degree of accuracy and sophistication at the local level.

Ms. Whiting also said that whenever a change in methods or technology alters the ratings system financial performance is at stake, and companies with a direct interest in the outcome are likely to try to influence the process. Citing well-documented efforts by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. to spend millions of dollars to delay the LPM launch and malign Nielsen’s reputation, Ms Whiting noted that News Corp. has hired more than a half dozen lobbying and communications consulting firms, and is financing and directing the activities of the ad hoc organization Don’t Count Us Out in New York, Los Angeles and Chicago.