Viewers want their internet TV. More than 170 million individuals viewed over 30 billion videos online in the United States in January, over a third of them on YouTube. Hulu was the next most popular site, with 900 million views, which is ten percent less than the previous month. Online video is increasingly seen on the television screen. One in four Americans watch internet television more than once a week, but see it in addition to traditional television rather than as a substitute, concludes a new study from In-Stat.
Google sites, primarily YouTube, attracted over 136 million viewers, with over 90 videos per viewer, according to ComScore. Hulu was the fifth most popular video destination in the United States, with 38 million viewers. They watched on average over 23 videos each, representing 2.3 hours per viewer, suggesting that they were sampling many episodes, rather than watching them all.
The total online video audience dropped slightly in January compared to December, which is not in itself unusual. There is clearly an enormous appetite for online video, with the number of views doubling over the last year, although it is still marginal in comparison to the total viewing of broadcast television.
People want the best of both worlds, with both pay-television and over-the-top video, concludes Keith Nissen of In-Stat. “Nearly 40% of consumer broadband household respondents want a combination of linear TV and on-demand TV, and nearly three quarters want to acquire all their video content from their pay TV service provider.”
Recent research found that while personal computers remain the primary means for viewing internet television, people are increasingly using other devices, including internet televisions and mobile phones.
They are connecting many different devices to their televisions, including media adapters, games consoles, and Blu-ray disc players. An estimated 24 million web-enabled devices were in use in the United States at the end of 2009. This is expected to grow to over a hundred million by 2013.