These 'People Meters' on CNN -- Kinda Creepy IMHO

[Emit]

How do these work?

I don't have cable, so, do regular viewers watch the 'People Meter' during the debate?

If so, how is that effecting the average viewer?

http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/02/21/videos.21feb.debate/index.html

I saw Frank Luntz a while back on Tavis Smiley and he was talking about these. Is this one of his creations?

[anigbrowl]

1. No, they're not during the debate. On the website...

you can watch with or without the 'people meters'. It's basically just a panel of ~30 people with an electronic thumbs-up/down device.

[scheming daemons]

2. It's simply a dial that they turn right when they agree with the candidate, and left when they ...

disagree.

The farther they turn right, the more enthusiastic their agreement and vice versa.


The computer takes all of their responses together and creates a moving graph line. When it is on "50", the dials are in the center. If everyone with a dial moved it all the way to the right, it would show "100"... "0" if they were all to the left.


When Hillary made the "xerox" line, the average went from around 50-55 down to about 20-25 IMMEDIATELY. It was a dramatic drop.

Conversely... when she made her statement at the end, the average jumped up into the 70s.

[Emit]

4. I get the concept

I heard it expained by Luntz before

I was just wondering if all the teevee viewers are watching the little graph while the debate is on, in real time.

[Radical Activist]

3. Its another way the media tells you what you're supposed to think.

They're always working on new ways of doing that.

[Emit]

5. Yeah, that's what I was getting at