My vision for the 2014-15 SpotVault going into this summer was to do what I've done for the War of 18-49 posts: have one table with purely the official, "raw" numbers and one with the metrics I've devised that are of debatable usefulness. Along those lines, I've been reworking the True formula to a point where I can somewhat clearly communicate how much each factor (viewing, competition, lead-in) impacts the number.
I'm still working toward that vision, but it's not there just yet. There are some radical changes to True, and I want to observe the new formula in action for a couple regular season weeks before I start breaking it apart in a public setting. There may be some further adjustments needed.
So for now, what you will see in the Vault is the following:
| Info | Ratings | Breakdowns | Metrics | |||||||||||
| # | Day | Date | Time | Length | Viewers | A18-49 | Share | Lead | 1st | 2nd | 3rd | 4th | True | Sitch |
| 1 | Su | 9/7/2014 | 8:00 | 2:00 | 4.63 | 2.0 | 6 | 4.9 | 2.6 | 1.9 | 1.7 | 1.6 | 1.69 | +19% |
| 2 | Tu | 9/9/2014 | 8:00 | 1:00 | 2.48 | 0.9 | 3 | n/a | 1.0 | 0.9 | 1.03 | -12% | ||
| 3 | Tu | 9/16/2014 | 8:00 | 1:00 | 2.42 | 1.0 | 3 | |||||||
This new table introduces the most important thing I want to put in the "raw" tables: half-hour breakdowns. Now you can see how a show progressed over the course of the telecast (and compared to its lead-in). I'm not sure there's much of a need for a record of breakdowns for every single episode, but we'll see how useful people find them this year. They're one of the very few things I have access to that doesn't get widely posted elsewhere, and maybe some intrepid readers can make more of them than I can, so I think it's worth a shot. I'll be posting some observations/explanations I've gleaned from looking at half-hour breakdowns as an intro to this feature sometime shortly.
Additionally, this table will contain the new True numbers, even though I'm not currently getting into an explanation of what's changed from last year. Please don't beat up on me too much for these numbers at this point, as they may get tweaked further. But it's close enough to the old formula that it may still have some usefulness.
So what's to come?
Phase II - The next upgrade will be an enhancement of the "averages to date" usually seen in the Vault. Namely, A18-49+ will be incorporated, as I've noticed there seems to be a decent amount of demand for how things stand in Plus as the season goes on. I can't introduce this now because there literally is no 2014-15 league average at this point, but it may show up as early as the Vault update next week (Wed 10/1).
Phase III - Later, a realization of the initial vision explained above: one table of "raw" data, one table that breaks down how much of an impact each aspect of the timeslot has according to the True formula. This will be down the road, but hopefully not too far.
