Nielsen says it's prepared to give viewing credit for the 26 live TV channels that Verizon FiOS TV customers will be able to watch through Microsoft's Xbox 360 later this month.   Microsoft partered with over 40 TV content providers for a couple of years, FiOS TV being one of them.

"TV content delivered through game consoles is eligible to contribute to ratings as long as the content is encoded and viewed on a metered set," Brian Fuhrer, Nielsen's senior vice president and product leader for national and cross-platform measurement, said in an emailed statement. "We are working closely with the content distributors and console manufacturers to make sure this continues to meet our requirements for detection."
"Verizon FiOS approached us in advance to discuss this new opportunity for Xbox Live consumers," Joseph Molko, senior vice president of content distribution and marketing for Viacom Media Networks, said in a statement. "We're open to distributing our content on this platform as the programming is Nielsen-rated and we'll be able to monetize viewing through ad sales."

further reading: http://lifeforgaming.blogspot.com/

With all the water down shows and reality TV non sense,
this would be better for the Nielsen ratings group than for the Xbox 360.