SAG-AFTRA has renewed its license with Nielsen, retaining the data measurement company as its source for measuring streaming viewership.
The labor union, which represents over than 160,000 professionals in the media and entertainment industries, will continue using Nielsen’s streaming content ratings service to gain insights into audiences on streaming platforms.
As an independent source, Nielsen serves as an objective measurement tool that can compliment first-party data from streaming platforms, providing a consistent and comparable lens for the union to gauge audiences for programs and episodes across streaming platforms.
The news comes over two years after SAG-AFTRA’s strike against the AMPTP in 2023, during which the union’s relationship with Nielsen proved to be a valuable tool as the union solidified new terms of the streaming bonus provisions of the 2023 TV/theatrical contract.
“With the pace of change in our industry and the additional metrics we are now tracking, having the Nielsen streaming data to underpin the first-party data we receive has been both essential and highly effective, and as a result we will be continuing to rely on that data moving forward,” SAG-AFTRA national executive director and chief negotiator Duncan Crabtree-Ireland said.
“It’s been incredibly rewarding to partner with SAG-AFTRA over the past year to serve as an independent arbiter of viewership for the best TV and movies in the world. We’re thrilled to continue the partnership,” Nielsen CEO Karthik Rao said in a statement to press.
As streaming continues to gain dominance over linear TV, there’s been a push across the board for transparency from streaming platforms regarding sharing viewership. Among the streamers, Netflix leads the way with viewership transparency with the streamer’s weekly top 10 lists and bi-annual viewership reports, but some streamers rarely share any numbers. Nielsen’s streaming charts, which are released weekly, help fill in the gaps of how streaming programs are performing across the board.
