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M

Magazine Page Exposure Studies
Research designed to estimate how often pages in magazines are read and the value to advertisers of that Repeat Reading. Abbreviated to MPX or PEX (Page EXposure). See QRS.

Market Penetration
See Penetration.

Mastering
The name given to the process of transferring videotape material onto master optical disk that is then used to produce video disks or CD-ROMs. See CD-ROM.

Masthead Cards
A Masthead card is the reproduction of a publication's "masthead" (logo as appearing on front cover) in the form of a show-card, which is used as recall-aid in the interview. Masthead cards may be loose (for Card Sorting methods) or bound into a booklet, then called Masthead Booklet. See also Card Sorting.

MATV
Abbreviation of Master Antennae Set. A MATV set is a set receiving a TV signal by wire from a communal aerial on a multi-occupancy building, such as a block of flats.

Media Plan
See Media Schedule.

Media Schedule
A plan of the advertising campaign which details which advertisements are to be used, using which media, on which dates, at what time of day and the number to be used etc. Also known as a Media Plan.

Mega 6
Large portrait upright poster site.

Memory Effects
Differences in response levels resulting from the respondent's ability to remember something he or she is asked about - such as reading events, when products were purchased, etc. The respondent's ability to remember reading events is especially important because of the extensive nature of readership questions on most readership surveys and the influence that inaccurate replies can have on readership scores.
The most obvious memory effect is the respondent's ability to remember the names of the publications, TV and radio programmes, etc., that he or she read, watched or listened to and to confuse them with each other.

Memory Prompts
See Aided Recall.

Meta Description
An HTML tag hidden in the source code to describe a web page’s contents.

Meta Keywords
On the web, a keyword is a reference to the content and/or type of meta element in a given web page’s HTML code to aid in the page’s ranking within a search engine’s listings (see Page Rank)

Meta Tags
META tags are part of HTML but are there for the sole use of search engine spiders. These (numerous) tags contain various information that the site owner wants to deliver to these spiders.

Microsite
Interactive ad format which is similar to Impule Response.  It offers an interactive overlay with the TV screen still shown in a quarter screen.

Middleware
Software that connects two applications so allowing data transfer to take place.

MIDI
Abbreviation of Musical Instrument Digital Interface. This refers to any interface that is used to connect musical instruments to computers.

Migration
Migration is the activity of a mobile phone user transferring their mobile number and occasionally their equipment to another provider.

Mobile Internet Connection
Any Internet connection using a mobile phone or other hand held devices such as PDA's. See General Packet Radio System and Web Enabled.

Modem
(MOdulate DEModulate) A device for communicating between computers using telephone lines or cable connections. Converts analogue signals into digital format.

MOSAIC
A proprietary Geodemographic classification system developed by Experian that is available for a number of European countries.

MPEG
Moving Pictures Experts Group is a standard for compressing digital video.

MP3
Compressed audio computer files that retain near CD quality sound. It is a widely used format for downloading music from the Internet since MP3 files are quick to download.

MPU
Message Plus Unit takes the form of a square advert that usually occurs in the middle of ordinary internet page content.

MPX
See Magazine Page Exposure Studies.

Multi-Channel Home
Households that are capable of receiving broadcasts from either cable or satellite channels in addition to terrestrial channels. Current homes penetration is 60.4% (15.0m homes)

Multimedia
1) Generic term used to describe applications that can bring together a combination of media such as text, sound, graphics, animation and video. Due to the size of the files they generate multimedia often uses delivered on CD-ROM. See New Media.
2) The use of more than one medium for ad campaigns - e.g. Press and TV, or Posters and Radio, etc. This would be termed a multimedia campaign.

Multiplex
A single broadcast frequency that carries a number multiple compressed digital radio and television channels.

Multi-Stage Sampling
The selection of a nationally representative sample may involve several stages of selection - Local Authorities at the first stage, wards at the second stage and individual addresses at the third stage. This is referred to as multi-stage sampling.

MUX
See Multiplex