Television Accounts for Less than Half of US Viewing Time for the First Time (wsj.com) 43
Powered by shows like "Suits" on Netflix, streaming's share of U.S. viewing time grew to a new high in July, while television viewing fell below 50% for the first time, according to new Nielsen data. From a report: The milestone is the latest sign of the rapid erosion of the cable-TV bundle, which has lost about a quarter of its subscribers over the past decade, as more Americans cut the cord in favor of streaming services like Netflix, Google's YouTube and Disney's Hulu. Cable television accounted for 29.6% of total U.S. viewing time in July, while broadcast attracted 20%, Nielsen said in a release published Tuesday.
Streaming services, meanwhile, captured 38.7% of Americans' viewing time, while a category labeled "Other" -- which Nielsen says includes usage such as DVD playback and gaming -- accounted for the remaining 11.6%. The growth of streaming platforms at the expense of cable and broadcast TV networks has accelerated in recent years, as most entertainment conglomerates introduced their own direct-to-consumer services to take on industry leader Netflix. As they sought to rapidly grow their subscriber bases, many of them chose to make their highest-profile and costliest content available exclusively on streaming. While original content helps reel in subscribers and build streaming brands, the most-watched programs are sometimes older TV shows. Last month, the show Americans spent the most time watching was "Suits," a legal drama starring Meghan Markle made for cable TV that made its debut more than a decade ago.
Streaming services, meanwhile, captured 38.7% of Americans' viewing time, while a category labeled "Other" -- which Nielsen says includes usage such as DVD playback and gaming -- accounted for the remaining 11.6%. The growth of streaming platforms at the expense of cable and broadcast TV networks has accelerated in recent years, as most entertainment conglomerates introduced their own direct-to-consumer services to take on industry leader Netflix. As they sought to rapidly grow their subscriber bases, many of them chose to make their highest-profile and costliest content available exclusively on streaming. While original content helps reel in subscribers and build streaming brands, the most-watched programs are sometimes older TV shows. Last month, the show Americans spent the most time watching was "Suits," a legal drama starring Meghan Markle made for cable TV that made its debut more than a decade ago.
What's the breakdown by age group? (Score:2)
Since advertisers mostly go after the coveted 14-40 target market, I have a hunch that cable TV is even worse off than this makes it look.
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Since advertisers mostly go after the coveted 14-40 target market, I have a hunch that cable TV is even worse off than this makes it look.
Advertisers? You mean those people who used to sell stuff that people actually watched instead of binging time-shifted content at 2x speed with ad blockers set to kill?
If there's an effort I'd be willing to pay for right behind an audit of the Fed, it would be auditing the actual retail value of fucking advertising, in order to burn it with fire. Your future eyeglasses and car window glass, will come with factory-encoded sponsors otherwise.
It's still 50%? (Score:2)
I expected it to be a lot lower
The only valid reason to watch in real time is breaking news and sports, especially when gambling is involved
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Me too. I suspect it's generally older people who still watch TV. And I mean those over 50 yo. Why? Because that's what Gen-X and Boomers are used to. I am gen-x but I am a computer tech, been that for 30+ years, so I don't care about TV. Haven't cared for 20+ years now. What's especially annoying is - you can't use an ad-blocker. ;)
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When traveling, my family stayed at a cheap hotel with no Wifi. So my kids turned on the TV. They were confused when the show they were watching stopped, and a woman started talking about laundry detergent. They had no idea what a "commercial" was.
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I just FF through ads. Easy-peasy
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Watching news on TV ?
What ?
Who actually *watches*, though? (Score:2)
Everyone I know under 40 puts a video stream on, then also scrolls/posts their handheld feeds at the same time. Very few shows require you to watch every second to keep up with what's happening. In the modern era there are a lot of shows like, say, "Agents of SHIELD" where (in typical MCU fashion) nothing that happens in the middle of each episode matters very much. It's all just a string of arbitrary Macguffins to set up the cliffhanger/twist in the final 5 minutes. Plot points introduced mid-episode and m
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I have no idea how people do that. It totally wrecks my concentration to have multiple streams on.
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In other words, shows today are crap because nobody pays attention anyways. I suspected as much.
Ugh... I *hate* that! (Score:2)
I had an ex-g/f who used to do that ALL the time. She was a self-proclaimed TV and movie buff and liked to brag about all the shows she'd already seen. But I soon discovered she would work from home all day with a TV on in the background and count that as "binge watching" shows. There's no way she could have been paying attention to at least half of the content!
Personally, I feel like any movie or show worth the time, effort and money to produce should be worth MY time to sit and watch, giving it my full at
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Everyone I know under 40 puts a video stream on, then also scrolls/posts their handheld feeds at the same time. Very few shows require you to watch every second to keep up with what's happening.
Well, at least you've explained the growing phenomenom of ass-itching irritation when speaking to the younger generation of eye-avoiders in person, and get the typical response of "What?" after more than 10 seconds of speaking to them being forced to repeat your message.
I mean after all there couldn't possibly be a real world side effect of developing an addiction to half-assing interaction by avoiding paying attention to something or someone communicating with you.. /s
Viewing time? (Score:2)
Interesting that the metric for market share is viewing time instead of dollars. Makes a huge difference. YouTube gets a lot of eyeballs and very little subscription money (but a ton of ad dollars). Meanwhile, Netflix, Disney Plus, and Apple TV+ also get a lot of eyeballs but many of those accounts are free courtesy of cell phone companies. Meanwhile, live sports may not account for a large number of viewing hours but does account for a lot of subscription dollars.
It is telling that streaming subscriptions
Streaming is Television (Score:4, Informative)
If I watch Suits via a streaming service, it is just as much "television" as if I had watched it on the cable channel that it was originally transmitted on. If I watch Friends via a streaming service it is just as much "television" as if I had watched it on the broadcast channel that it was originally broadcast on.
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Same here. If I am watching shows on a TV (or monitor, which is a TV) the delivery method is irrelevent. OTA, cable, Netflix, youtube, DVDs, or Kodi it's all 'watching TV' to me.
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It made a difference at one time, but with so many channels, and +1 channels it's mostly irrelevant now
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If I watch Suits via a streaming service, it is just as much "television" as if I had watched it on the cable channel that it was originally transmitted on. If I watch Friends via a streaming service it is just as much "television" as if I had watched it on the broadcast channel that it was originally broadcast on.
Erm... If you watch "suits" you should probably go outside and have a word with yourself.
It matters for two reasons with the same cause. Broadcast is fundamentally different to streaming. With streaming you request the content, timing and what they watch is largely controlled by the requester. With broadcast the content is controlled by the sender.
This means that there are fewer regulations on streaming services as they are generally more private. Unlike TV or radio you are not often exposed to stream
even lower (Score:1)
Sort of watch TV (Score:2)
I watch my fav shows while I play runescape on a laptop and my cat sleeps between my legs
Cut the cord? (Score:2)
My cord runs from my rabbit ear antenna to my TV set. Other than the few times my cat has chewed on it, it's still fine.
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current and future taxes funding the purpose of those rabbit ears
British hands typed this.
Not the best sign.... (Score:1)
There is still something to be said about broadcast and cinema media. Group experience is in my opinion the healthier way to do it. Certain media is better suited for multicast, on demand delivery. Narrative multiscened efforts are not in the category. The human mind does not learn best in that isolated environment.
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There is still something to be said about broadcast and cinema media. Group experience is in my opinion the healthier way to do it. Certain media is better suited for multicast, on demand delivery. Narrative multiscened efforts are not in the category. The human mind does not learn best in that isolated environment.
There's probably something to be said about the decline of group experience having an impact on how easy we are to keep poised to want to kill each other. There's no "everybody watches that" thing that keeps us rubes standing around the water cooler or the coffee pot and chit-chatting about whatever just to see what everybody's opinion was on the show, which inevitably leads to kid talk, dog talk, neighbor talk, what'd you do last night talk, and so on. Much better to have us all segregated away from each o
they need more reality shows (Score:2)
No, just kidding. They need to settle the writers' strike so they can stop this nonsense. Only thing I watch on broadcast TV is PBS, old reruns of Star Trek/Columbo and sports. The rest just numbs the mind too much.
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If you support your local PBS station to the tune of 5 bucks a month, you can watch all their stuff online - no cable required. One of the better "streaming" deals around.
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You can find episodes of Quincy ME on YouTube. When I came across them it was funny seeing actors who later went on in other series/movies.
Star Trek/Columbo ? (Score:2)
A Star Trek / Columbo crossover would make for a fabulous new show, the best ST since Voyager or maybe even DS9.
Imagine Columbo in his trenchcoat and cigar discussing the situation with Kirk, helping him find clues as to why the Horta suddenly started killing the miners. In another episode Columbo has to unlock the spooky mystery of Catspaw.
Sports... and that's almost it. (Score:2)
When sports stops being so disjointed in offerings, that's it for TV. TV is still the most cost-effective way of covering enough of "all" of the sports.
If you watch baseball, football, and hockey, cable is still your go-to.
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Even TV is being streamed (Score:2)
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I watch live TV via the browser, which category does that fall under?
Why do I have a feeling the next "cool" Youtube idea is livestreaming yourself watching TV on one of those old-fashioned things that hang on the wall...
Advert article (Score:1)
Writing an essay (Score:1)