The CRE's Big Data event is set for Tuesday, February 11, from noon to 4pm eastern time, once again at the Time & Life Bldg. in New York; lunch will be served.

The event will focus on quality issues of Big Data and audience measurement.

We have a lineup of prominent guest speakers -- Reg Baker of Michigan State Univ.; Vasant Dhar, director of the Center for Business Analytics at NYU's Stern School; Paul Donato of Nielsen; and members of the Watson team at IBM – with more speakers expected.

The CRE's Big Data Committee is chaired by Stacey Schulman, Senior Vice President and Chief Research Officer for the Television Bureau of Advertising (TVB).

Nielsen clients were sent an email with details on the gathering. Key takeaways from the discussion will be included in a subsequent newsletter and posted to our web site.

The CRE approved a grant to a scholarship in the name of Susan Whiting, at her alma mater Denison University. Susan, who recently retired from her position as vice chair at Nielsen, was instrumental in the creation of the CRE in 2005.

While much discussion of audience trends in TV and digital video revolves around entertainment and sports programming, an important element of national and, especially, local television and digital media is news programming.

The highly regarded non-profit Poynter Institute, a leading source of journalism information and education, recently hosted an event at its St. Petersburg, Florida, offices exploring "The Future of News Audiences." The event drew a number of prominent names in journalism, research and social media from around the country.

The CRE was proud to play a role in terms of representation at the event as well as in other support. Richard Zackon, CRE Facilitator, moderated a panel, "Poynter in the Data: What Research Tells Us," including CRE Chair Ceril Shagrin of Univision, along with fellow CRE members Billy McDowell of Raycom Media, Keenan Pendergrass of Cox Media Group, Beth Rockwood of Discovery Communications, Stacey Schulman of the Television Bureau of Advertising and Jack Wakshlag of Turner Broadcasting.

Poynter's own report on the event can be found here.

The CRE will get a showcase platform at the March 23-26 ARF Re:Think conference for the follow-up to its 2013 "Talking Social TV" study of the relationship of social media use and TV viewing.

"Let's Talk Social TV: The Role of Social Media in Television Discovery and Engagement" was selected among the top 10 scoring papers from the Re:Think 2014 Call for Papers, which drew 168 submissions.

Beth Rockwood, Senior Vice President, Market Resources and Advertising Sales Research, Discovery Communications, and chair of the CRE's Social Media Committee, will be presenting findings from this new study alongside research partner Ed Keller of Keller Fay Group on Monday, March 24, in a session entitled "The Role of Social Media in Television." .

Newsletter readers will learn more about the study in a subsequent edition.

The CRE's Social Media Committee is now out of the field with the follow-up to its 2013 "Talking Social TV" study. The findings of its first study were presented at a number of events during spring and summer 2013 and can be found on the CRE website. For this latest study, researchers collected data for three weeks, compared to a one-week period for the prior study. The CRE expects to announce findings of the new study in the first quarter.

What happens in Vegas doesn't always stay in Vegas.

Scott Brown, Senior Vice President, Technology & Strategic Relations at Nielsen, has been a fixture at the annual Consumer Electronics Show for years. He also has been the CRE's go-to guy for information on the latest developments of interest to consumer electronics enthusiasts – and audience researchers.

Scott recently hosted a webinar for CRE members, offering his observations from last month's mammoth show in Las Vegas. Listeners heard about new products such as 4K ultra HD TV screens stretching to 105 inches, a Sony ultra-HD "short-throw" projector producing a 148-inch 4K picture, products from Samsung enabling users to stream content from smartphones to a TV set and to view live TV alongside web content – and, on the mobile front, LG and Samsung flexible OLED phone displays, smartwatches and an Oculus Rift virtual reality headset described as a "gamer's paradise."

Readers are invited to listen to the audio and view the slides of Scott's discussion.

The CRE has begun a committee for the study of the effects of commercial pod length. The committee, chaired by Hadassa Gerber, Director of Research for the Syndicated Network Television Association (SNTA), expects to begin its inaugural research effort in 2014.

We're pleased to welcome back Judy Vogel, Vice President of Research at Gannett Company, Inc.; Michael Nathanson, Senior Research Analyst at MoffettNathanson, LLC; and Bryon Schafer, Senior Vice President of Research at Warner Bros. Television. All three were prior CRE members while with other companies, and were re-admitted at the CRE's December quarterly meeting.

The Steering Committee of the CRE voted to approve the establishment of a $30,000 scholarship in the name of Susan Whiting, at her alma mater Denison University. Susan, who will be retiring from her position as vice chair at Nielsen at year-end, was instrumental in the creation of the CRE in 2005.

The CRE welcomes its newest members: