I have a Dish 622 and a Tivo S3.

Suppose for a minute that my TV viewing is monitored by Neilson or some other organization.

Neither of my boxes are ever turned off (although the 622 goes into standby after 8 hours of non-activity). When turn off my TV, and my Tivo, for example, stays on the last watched channel, does that channel continue to be considered "viewed" by a ratings service, or can they detect that the TV is off and not being watched?

Also, let's say I have a season pass for a show, but I end up watching it live instead of watching the recording of it. Then I immediately delete the recording. There again, does a ratings service know that I watched it live?

...just a couple of things I've wondered about.

As far as I know, they don't rate you unless you are asked to do so. Just because you have a DVR, doesn't mean you're part of the ratings process.

Also, I'm not sure if half the DVR ratings are even based on the DVR activity itself. People may have to manual log what they watch on their DVR and when in some cases.

As far as leaving your DVR on a channel, I'm sure they have a system in place to take that into account. For example, they may only log a show as being watched if you tune to it (or there has been activity sometime close to the time of the show), rather than just being on the channel.

For that matter, they may only be counting recorded views rather than live views for DVR data.

As far as I know, they don't rate you unless you are asked to do so. Just because you have a DVR, doesn't mean you're part of the ratings process.

That's why the word "suppose."

That's why the word "suppose."
That's why I edited my answer. I originally misread it as you assuming you were.

That's why I edited my answer. I originally misread it as you assuming you were.

No, I never assumed that I was. I've just read so much info on here (mainly in HOTP) about DVR viewing compilations that I was just wanting to learn a little more about the process.

Thanks for the info.

I don't know about the Dish DVR, but TiVo considers the user inactive if they haven't touched the remote in 30 minutes (or was it 15 minutes?). There is no way for TiVo or anyone else to detect whether a user with component or s-video has the TV on or off.

That said, I haven't read anything to indicate that TiVo takes data on live TV viewing. I know they take data on commercials skipped and programs recorded, and they sell that -- minus all your personal information -- to networks and other marketing companies if and only if you opted in for that. The process of "opting in" required several confirmations through email.