Oprah Gets Reprimanded for “Begging” People to Watch OWN

February 15, 2012 by Kellie Williams in Latest News with 5 Comments

On Sunday, during the Grammy awards, Oprah Winfrey tweeted to more than 9 million followers, urging them to watch her station, the OWN network. The since deleted tweet read,

“Every 1 who can please turn to OWN especially if you have a Nielsen box.”

Her twitter replies flared up with some rather harsh responses from her followers:

And in addition to offending some fans, the 58-year-old media mogul, had also allegedly broken a cardinal rule of Nielsen’s, in which one cannot influence a viewers TV habits. The Nielsen company and OWN executives reportedly met for a meeting to discuss the situation. The outcome resulted in Oprah tweeting an apology Monday morning saying,

“I removed the tweet at the request of Nielsen. I intended no harm and apologize for the reference.”

Nielsen spokesman Matt Anchin also released an email,

“It is Nielsen’s policy to note attempts to single out panel members to either change their viewing habits or otherwise influence or affect their reporting.”

In addition, Nielsen has placed an asterisk next to OWN’s rating after she made the statement on twitter, noting that there might have been some bias which in turn influenced the ratings. Interestingly enough, Oprah was actually tuned into the Grammy’s herself that night as she praised some of the performances throughout the show. Does this all seem to be blown out of proportion over a tweet, or is her influence that heavy, that what she tweeted was unfair?

[News One]

– @Ayo_Leslo

Authored by: Kellie Williams

http://thejasminebrand.com