Audience Measurement Application for Set-Top Box Participation Tracking
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Existing audience measurement systems for television programming are limited, requiring additional hardware and only monitoring a small percentage of households, failing to gather viewer experience or opinion, and only reporting channel tuning and time.
Innovation Solution
A method and system for delivering media content with an audience measurement application over a distribution network, allowing viewer interaction through inquiries and feedback collection, determining participation levels based on response information, without additional hardware, and enabling more comprehensive viewer data collection.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Measurement precision
If home set meters are deployed to measure audience viewership, then measurement coverage is improved, but hardware cost and device complexity increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extracts the audience measurement functionality from dedicated home set meters and integrates it into the existing set-top box. The measurement application is delivered as software that runs on the set-top box, eliminating the need for separate hardware meters while maintaining measurement capabilities.
Solution Approach 2:
The set-top box, which already exists in most households, is made multi-functional by adding audience measurement capabilities through the delivered application. This allows the same device to serve both media content delivery and viewership measurement functions, eliminating the need for additional specialized hardware.
2Measurement precision
If home set meters are provided to households, then measurement coverage is improved, but the number of monitored households remains limited
Solution Approach 1:
By making the existing set-top box multi-functional with audience measurement capabilities, the system can be deployed to all households that have a set-top box, which is the vast majority of TV households. This eliminates the limitation of providing specialized meters to only a small fraction of households.
3Loss of information
If home set meters are used to report channel tuning and time, then basic viewing data is collected, but viewer experience and opinion data are not gathered
Solution Approach 1:
The system implements feedback mechanisms where the measurement application can solicit viewer responses and opinions about the media content. This allows the system to collect both basic viewing data and subjective viewer experience information, providing a more comprehensive view of audience engagement.
4Measurement precision
If conventional home set meters are deployed, then basic viewership reporting is achieved, but data accuracy and comprehensiveness are limited
Solution Approach 1:
The measurement application incorporates feedback mechanisms that actively solicit viewer responses and opinions about media content. This enables the system to collect comprehensive data including both objective viewing metrics and subjective viewer experience information, significantly improving data accuracy and comprehensiveness.
Data Source
AI summary
Embodiments of the invention include systems and methods for measuring audience participation over a distribution network. An example method may include delivering media content to a viewer's CPE over a distribution network and delivering an audience measurement application associated with the media content over the distribution network. The audience measurement application can be configured for execution by the viewer's CPE, and can be programmed to generate at least one inquiry for display to the viewer in association with viewing the media content and to request at least one response by the viewer to be entered via the viewer's CPE. The method may further include receiving response information associated with the response to the inquiry from the viewer's CPE over the distribution network, and determining the viewer's participation level associated with the media content based at least in part on the response information received from the viewer's CPE.