DVR and Nielsen: Can these Numbers Be Right?

So people who own DVRs do not fast-forward through commercials as much as had been feared, the New York Times reports today, reacting to data released by Nielsen last week about the specific viewership of commerials. "Over all, in the first week of May, the proportion of viewers who stuck around for TV commercials was 69.9 percent among the 18-to 49-year-olds in households with DVR..." Wow. I'm shocked. Seventy percent? That number seems really high to me. I will do anything to avoid sitting through ads on TV. Maybe I'm the exception. Or maybe not. If you look at the numbers for the May 10th episode of The Office, commercials were skipped by 50.9 percent of DVR owners who watched the show (the number counts both live viewers and those who watched it later). That seems more in line with my perception of viewer behavior, but still, it must be the live views that are boosting the percentage.