WCRB to simulcast on 88.7 in R.I.

[Garrett Wollman]

<<On Fri, 03 Jun 2011 19:04:41 +0000 (GMT), Mark Laurence <marklaurence@mac.com> said:

> PPM ratings for the most recent month in Boston show:

> 94.1% of people age 18-24 cumed radio in April.  They listen an average
> of 10 hours 15 minutes a week.

Sample size?

I'm generally pretty suspicious of these numbers, for three reasons:

(1) The sample is very small, particularly when sliced down into
narrow demos like this.

(2) The sample is highly biased.  What non-user of radio is likely to
agree to participate?  How much compensation is Arbitron even offering
these days?  (Is it still $5?)  For a lot of young people, that's not
nearly enough to get them to carry a pager-sized device with them
wherever they go.  How does Arbitron even identify the sample?

(3) People are exposed to radio in many different places over which
they may have little or no control.  They can hardly be said to be
listening in this situation.

-GAWollman