• by Wayne Friedman , January 15, 2015

Are lousy smart TV remote controls/interfaces hurting social media and other Internet usage on TV sets? 

In a study, Philips uWand says social networking by smart TV owners have declined to 10% from 30% in 2012, with Internet browsing down to 25% from 44%. Philips also says gaming on smart TVs has dropped 16% from a high of 28% in 2012.

Philips does have a stake in this. It is trying to sell a new more intuitive TV remote — uWand, which uses a camera-based technology for direct pointing and gesture control, which would make it easier to use Internet-based apps. 

Still, at the same time, many TV set reviewers have complained for years about navigation devices that are still too complex on smart TV sets.

However, Philips also notes that growing smart TV usage has meant a rise in other services — such as catch-up TV efforts. Comcast’s Xfinity service, for example, has seen use on smart TVs grow to 61% last year, from 48% in 2014.

Allthough 47% of respondents now own a smart TV, and 96% of those are connected to the Internet, more than half (57%) of respondents still use other devices to watch and interact with Internet-based content.

Of those surveyed, 92% use a button-based remote to interact with their smart TV. Research is based on a survey of 111 U.S. respondents conducted by Philips uWand in November 2014.