philip lelyveld The world of entertainment technology

Nielsen’s X-Platform Report: The Rise of Game Console Content Delivery

The average American watched around five hours of video a day in the last three months of 2011; 98 percent—on a traditional TV set.

“Although this ratio is less than it was just a few years ago, and continues to change, the fact remains that Americans are not turning off,” Nielsen’s latest cross-platform report says.  ...more than 8 million homes acquired an HDTV set in the last year, bringing the total number of households with an HDTV set to 80.2 million. Nielsen said the numbers indicate TV remains the dominant platform for watching video content. Traditional live and time-shifted viewing accounted for nearly 34 hours a week (out of 35) in the fourth quarter of 2011.

The way content is delivered, however, is changing. Nielsen found that two-thirds of game consoles in homes are now connected to the Internet, creating a new content delivery “conduit” for TV sets. It said more than half of Netflix users watch on their TVs through a game console or other streaming device. ...

The report said that around 33.5 million mobile phone users now watch video on the devices—up nearly 36 percent from 4Q10. However, the time spent doing so remains modest: just 8 minutes a week. Online viewing accounted for around 30 minutes a week.

Broadcast-only homes declined from 11.1 million in 4Q10 to 11 million in 4Q11. Wired cable homes fell by nearly 3 million to 60.5 million. Satellite held steady, while telcoTV homes grew from 7.3 million to 8.5 million. Broadcast-only homes with broadband grew from 4.5 million to 5.1 million.

See the full post here: http://www.tvtechnology.com/article/nielsens-x-platform-report-the-rise-of-game-console-content-delivery/213269