• by Joe Mandese  @mp_joemandese, October 21, 2010

TV may be going everywhere - from hand-held mobile to streaming Internet services and devices - but one of the biggest alternate channels for television content is already in millions of American households: video game console devices such as Microsoft's Xbox, Sony's PS3, and Nintendo's Wii. According to new research being released today by Knowledge Networks, one in five U.S. consumers already is using game systems to watch TV or movie content at least once a month.

The new report -- "Over-the-Top TV: A Complete Video Landscape," which comes from KN's ongoing Home Technology Monitor tracking studies -- details how American consumers already are utilizing 23 different methods for accessing TV and movie content outside traditional "live" TV viewing platforms such as linear broadcast, cable and satellite TV.

The KN report reveals that 21% of American consumers already utilize their video game systems to view conventional TV/movie content via their consoles, and that using them to play DVDs (17%) is currently their No. 1 option, but a significant percentage also is using them to view content either via Blueray discs (6%) or via some method of online streaming or downloading (6%). Those numbers shoot up for younger demographics that are most likely to utilize video game systems as a primary entertainment device (see table below).

One of the primary reasons, says KN Vice President David Tice, is that the leading video game systems were designed as so-called "Trojan horses" that had advanced TV viewing options such as high-definition DVD, Blueray, and streaming functionality built into them from the start.

"What we wanted to try and do is put the newer options in context with some of the older things, or the more mundane ways of watching TV," says Tice. To put the current video game usage of video programming in context, Tice says that video game systems are now used as by as many consumers (21%) as old-fashioned VCRs to watch video content at least once a month.

Uses a videogame console system at least once a month to watch movies or TV programs using...	All persons 13-54	13-31	32-45	46-54
DVDs	17%	27%	13%	7%
Blu-ray discs	6	10	4	2
Streamed or downloaded video	6	11	3	1
Overall use (viewing by any of the above means thru a game console)	21%	31%	17%	8%

 

 

Source: Knowledge Networks.