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RSSCiting a famous prediction by MIT Media Lab founder Nicholas Negroponte that use of the Internet would have overtaken TV viewership by now, Bulgrin told attendees at an MPG Collaborative Alliance meeting in New York that was anything but the case.
"What's really happening here, is that the people who are using both is increasing," Bulgrin's ESPN colleague Glenn Enoch echoed. "That's where we are really seeing the increases. And the people who are only using TV, is shrinking down."
Enoch added that the real significance is that media consumers are adopting a "best available screen thing," and are switching platforms based on proximity, time of day, and where their best available access to comparable media content might be. The breakthrough for advertisers, the ESPN executives, said would be to understand the best places and times to target consumers based on their screen predilections.
The ESPN conclusions are drawn from several years of proprietary and syndicated research, especially a bounty of data that was culled over the summer from such sources as Nielsen Media Research, Nielsen Online, NielsenConnect, IMMI, Knowledge Networks/SRI, and the Center for Media Design at Ball State University.
Perhaps the most striking insight to be drawn form the analysis is a so-called "quintile" study - a study that divides media consumers into five categories ranging from heavy to light users of a medium - utilizing a custom "All Day, Every Day" study conducted by Knowledge Networks/SRI for ESPN.
Among Internet users, the study found the heaviest users spend 85 minutes online each day, but spend 271 minutes watching TV. The Internet's lightest users, conversely, spend only one minute online each day, but spend 214 minutes watching TV. The average of all Internet users was 19 minutes online and 236 minutes watching TV, offering the clearest evidence of all of how far off Negroponte's prediction actually is.
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The ESPN findings point out that the multi-platform media usage is not a “zero sum” game. The Nielsen and Harris Interactive research along with the ESPN statements seem to show the value is to embrace the combination of both TV and Internet.
The very nature of television presents advantages that internet doesn’t deliver like 1080p HD on a wall size screen. Likewise the internet presents advantages that TV does not, like a world of information on demand in an interactive mode.
Harris Communications Corp has introduced a product, Dynacast, that makes it possible for the broadcaster to control a session of the consumer’s web browser and provide directed use of the internet that enhances the on air content. Bringing the two platforms together and using the strengths of each becomes a “sum” that is greater than the whole of the two.
Ad supported broadcasting needs to deliver consumer to the door of the advertiser. Think of the possibilities if the viewers/consumers are delivered to the advertiser’s web site when their commercial airs on TV.
Consumers aren't stupid, and in the main they aren't loyal. If they like a show like NCIS, they don't care which network broadcasts it. They don't care if it is broadcast or cable. They don't care if it is internet delivered or in the mailbox from Netflix or on a purchased DVD. But added to this is the value equation. On broadcast in order to see a show you "pay" by knowing that there will be 12 minutes of ads an hour in lieu of a financial contribution. On cable the consumer expects either less ads or nil ads because they are paying a subscription fee. Online, the dominant mind set is that "no-one pays".
The problem as I see it, is that unless the people/businesses that undertake the risk of creating new content (i) receive upfront backing and (ii) are financially rewarded for success, then if the dominant medium of delivery becomes the internet (basically free) then there will be no money to commission and create the next new blockbuster programmes, and then the issue of which delivery medium is dominant becomes irrelevant!
By all means call me a Luddite for my views - but I prefer to see this as being pragmatic and conected to the rel world by refusing to be swept up in the hype. Remember, just because something is possible doesn't mean it should be done. Anyway, at the end of the day, it is the consumer that will decide - but then again, that is probably just the Luddite in me coming out.
John Grono GAP Research Sydney Australia
The threat the Internet holds for content providers like ESPN and Disney comes from their lemming-like policy of collective self-destruction. For reasons of which completely elude me, providers seem to think that a typical “cable/network” :60 minute program “paid for” with 12 minutes of commercials should come over the Internet virtually commercial free. Consumers unfortunately are not stupid, and free beats paid any day.
Technically, I suspect that the Internet’s backbone and resulting infrastructure isn’t robust enough yet to handle cable’s distributional volume. More to the point, the Internet will never have that backbone unless content providers like ESPN charge Internet consumers the same price they charge cable consumers – 12 minutes of commercials per hour. Until that happens we’ll continue to get more useless research studies that measure delivery rather than impact.
This is the core of what I just read. Negropante isn't wrong...it just depends on your perspective and overall point of view regarding media consumption. If a consumer purchases their internet content from a cable provider, and uses a PS3, a Set Top Box Computer, and a Laptop all connected to a single viewing device, like a big screen HD LCD, what exactly is the consumer's perception of what they are "doing" at any given time in their consumption of the media?
Your assertions are outrageous, because they cite a source that controls the outcome and the language associated with the outcome. ESPN / Disney / ABC have fought the tide for years against their own better interests, seeking to limit their own revenues in regard to online viewership. They will not distribute their TV commercial content in their online distribution of their shows, and they will not allow their advertisers to benefit from increased exposures by delivering popular live sporting events via internet broadcast, such as thanksgiving nights Texas vs. Texas A&M game. By colluding with the satellite and cable operators to subvert the growth of internet viewership, by not allowing distribution of popular events online they are cutting their nose to spite their face in so many words.
The idea that online viewership has not overtaken TV viewership, and that this is some indication of a preference for TV viewership over online viewership, is just ridiculous. The very company making the assertions is the company that is preventing a fair competition between the mediums from unfolding. If all things were equal, and the networks simply broadcasted over their websites in real time, cable subscription and broadcast TV would die off in less than 24 months.
I don't pretend to know the full extent of the legal and revenue systems that continue to limit TV content distribution on the internet but it's obvious a bias exists that matches the traditional Luddite mindset/ cycle of fear associated with new paradigms in technology. Live events (sports) will continue to define live TV viewership standards because they are live events, and there is difficulty in time shifting that viewership. ESPN/ ABC/ Disney could be leading the way in integrating and simplifying viewership for consumers but cling to their old world definitions of distribution, forgetting that most people don't care what pipe you shove your material through, only that it is available on the screens we have in our homes.