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TVB responds

In your Special Report, TV: Focus on Audience Research, in the Oct. 5 issue, the article headlined ‘TVB urges 4-P meters’ has caused some confusion between the Marketing and Advertising Work Group of the D.O.C. – which I chaired, and the Television Measurement Committee set up by the industry to assess and recommend an electronic audience measurement system.

Just to set the record straight, the statement of tvb’s support of a passive, portable person-meter was in reference to a long-term development by a Canadian company to market an anharmonic coded meter system.

This is not the 4-P meter system that bbm refers to in its partnership with other Canadian, u.s. and Japanese organizations, and is in no way intended to be confused with tvb taking a position that would interfere with the Television Measurement Committee’s deliberations.

In tvb’s long-range plan, we state:

– It is unlikely that electronic measurement in all its current form will be economically viable for all markets in Canada. Short-term solutions based on meter and diary measurement, and long-term solutions based on electronic measurement must be developed.

– The broadcast industry must unite and respond to the advertisers’ needs for the immediate implementation of an electronic system of television market measurement using existing technology to re-establish television’s credibility with the advertising community.

Cameron L. Fellman

President

Television Bureau of Canada

Toronto