resolved:

I'm swearing off all giving of unsolicited advice for Lent. (No, I'm not observant, but it's a useful timeframe.)

I'm doing it because I have discovered how incredibly bleeping annoying unsolicited advice is, and I need to recognize that, as helpful or useful as I think a particular nugget of insight (ha ha) is, to someone else, it might very well be the same kind of incredible bleeping annoyingness that I loathe.

For the sake of sanity, 'unsolicited advice' does not include, 'tonight it would be a good if you would do the dishes, dear,' because that's not advice -- it's an observation/reminder that I need the dishes done if I'm to cook dinner tomorrow. I can also offer solicited advice. However! If someone asks for advice on a topic, I can't offer adivce about a different-but-related topic. If they say "How can I save money buying meat?" I can say, "I save money with [meat-buying methods X, Y and Z]," but I cannot say, "I save money by eating more vegetables!" That's not what they asked. (And this is also a realm in which I get readily driven crazy: "How can I protect myself from [virus] on Windows XP SP3?" is not usefully answered by "Get a Mac!", and "How can I deal with [social problem caused by introversion]?" is not usefully answered by "Become an extrovert!" So I should avoid crazymaking others in the same way.)

We'll see how it goes.

Ask LJ

So I keep seeing people say some variant of, "I don't like Dollhouse"/"I don't like Dollhouse yet"/"I think Dollhouse is kinda boring"/"Fox clearly ruined Dollhouse" followed by "but I'm still watching it because Whedon needs the ratings"/"to keep its ratings up because I'm sure it'll improve"/"to show my support of Joss by ratings"/"to keep it from being cancelled."

(For those of you who aren't aware, they're referring to Joss Whedon's new Fox SF-ish series Dollhouse starring Eliza Dushku.)

Leaving aside the questions of whether Dollhouse is any good (I haven't seen it; it's pretty clearly Not For Me), and whether Whedon deserves that kind of fannish loyalty, I have an entirely pragmatic question.

Does watching a series 'to boost the ratings' actually do any good if you're not a Nielsen family?

I know that back in the day, it didn't, not really. But it wouldn't shock me too much if modern cable television got its numbers some other way. I mean, clearly, due to the prevalence of On Demand, there's some way that your cable box can send signal as well as receive it. Does cable TV use this capability to monitor viewing statistics?

Because if not, it seems like watching for the ratings is pretty pointless unless you're actually a Nielsen ratings subject. But if there is a new method of determining viewership that doesn't rely on Nielsen numbers, it might make a difference after all.