"Mass media doesn't exist anymore," says Paul Saffo, a director at the Institute for the Future in Menlo Park, Calif. "Instead we have personal media. Increasingly, people fill their information space with only what they want to see — things that reinforce their worldview. Take away channel surfing, and you never have to see anything that you don't choose to see."

...cyberspace, he says, enforces the idea of like-minded consensual groups, replacing the more diverse community of a city or a neighborhood. "The old idea that you had to get along with people you might not necessarily like or agree with because they live in your town is vanishing," he says. "You can now occupy 100% of your information space with only those things that support your worldview. ..."

...Nielsen Media Research recently entered a licensing agreement with TiVo and DirectTV under which they will record the viewing habits of 10,000 TiVo and as many as 20,000 DirectTV subscribers. The reports will eventually be made available to Nielsen's clients.

"We decided six months ago that this would be a good idea," says Scott Brown, senior vice president for strategies, relationships, marketing and technology at Nielsen. "There is a great interest in time shifting within the industry." So much interest that next year Nielsen will be changing its business model to include DVR and VCR recording and playback habits in the data it collects for television ratings, which, according to Brown, will create a new world order in the industry.

"The currency in how everyone buys and sells television will completely change," he says.

And if Nielsen says it, it must be so."

Original article: All alone, off the beaten wavelength
By Mary McNamara, Times Staff Writer
Copyright 2004 Los Angeles Times