Message from Michael - September 28, 2009

Message From Michael                                 

                                                                                                                        September 28, 2009                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                  

      AN ONLINE VIDEO FLOOD WATCH

      I DON’T WANT TO BE ALONE

      AND THE AWARD GOES

      COCKTAIL CHATTER - DEATH

 

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      AN ONLINE VIDEO FLOOD WATCH:  At least that’s what appears to be happening, according to figures from Internet backbone provider Cisco.  In four years time (2013) the company says 90% of all IP traffic will be video.  Going even further, the company’s VP of ‘video product strategy,’ Malachy Moynihan says 60% of all video will be ‘consumed by consumers’ over IP networks.  Computer chip maker Intel says that in six years time (2015), more than 12 Billion devices will be capable of connecting to 500 Billion hours of TV and video content.  The company’s CTO, Justin Ratner, says that translates into more than one TV-cable device for every man and woman on the planet.  By the end of next year, analyst firm Screen Digest says there will be 1.2 Million 3D capable TV sets in American homes and in four years time (yes, 2013), that figure is expected to rise to 9.7 Million or 8% of all households.  This all came out of Intel’s Developer Forum held in San Francisco and reported by the BBC online.  A separate report, the Consumer Internet Barometer, says that one in four U.S. households (25%) watch TV online.  That’s up from one in five (20%) last year, according to the report put together by The Conference Board and TNS.  And, of course, leading the pack is Hulu which has shown a fourfold increase (from 8% to 32%) over the past year.  The report says two-thirds of ‘online TV viewers’ (an important distinction) access television through the ‘official TV channel’ home page while less than half do it through YouTube.  All that would explain why Nielsen Media Research says its “TV Everywhere” which monitors shows online could be counted in the overall TV ratings system in less than two years (2011).  Nielsen officials say they are moving cautiously since ‘$70 Billion of television advertising is bought and sold using Nielsen ratings.’ 

Of course the real proof that online video is taking off comes from Emmy Awards where sitcom star Julia Louis-Dreyfus joked that she was honored to be presenting the awards “on the last official year of network broadcast television.”  The CEO of Tremor Media says the reports of TV’s death, as personified by Louis-Dreyfus’ comment, are greatly exaggerated.  But CEO Jason Glickman does say that this period of 2009 and 2010 will be remembered as the turning point for online video advertising.  The reason for saying that is that large brand advertisings are planning seven figure online video buys on a regular basis, and he says this period will mark the beginning of “online video’s aggressive five-year climb to the highest level of the food chain in the media mix.”

Just to add a little more perspective to this, keep in mind that even Nielsen’s Three Screen Report notes that the average American watches more than 141 hours of TV per month, an all-time high; while that ‘average American’ watches only about three hours of video online on the Internet each month and mobile device users are also watching only about three hours of video on their mobile phones and other devices.  The so-called A2/M2 (Anytime Anywhere Media Measurement) report says that a third of the time that people (with Internet access – an important distinction) spend online is spent online in front of the television.  And, no, I haven’t quite reconciled the Cisco projection that nearly two thirds of video ‘consumed by consumers’ will be over IP networks, with the fact that Americans watch 141 hours of video on television and ‘only’ six hours of video online or on mobile devices.

      I DON’T WANT TO BE ALONE:  Similar to my semi-joking point about the Emmy Awards, you know that social networking has become real when Hollywood decides to make a movie about it.  Entertainment newspaper Variety reports that actor Jesse Eisenberg will play Facebook founder Mark Zuckenberg while Justin Timberlake will play Napster founder Sean Parker.  (No, I don’t know Eisenberg either, although I am semi-familiar with the movies The Squid and the Whale and Adventureland.)  All right, all right, that may not be the big news in social media news.  The big news is that consumer activity on social networking and blogging sites has tripled in the last year from six percent last year at this to 17% now.  Spending on such sites has more than doubled in the same time (from $49 Million to $108 Million) and that, as a percentage of total U.S. Online (emphasis – only online) ad spending, it also doubled from 7% to 15%.  And, of course, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention (although it’s been reported extensively) that Facebook is claiming to have topped the 300 Million mark in worldwide users  -- tripling its numbers from a year ago.  Although Facebook doesn’t break out the figures worldwide, Nielsen reports the number of U.S. Facebook users at 103.8 Million – meaning that two thirds of its users are in other countries.  A separate report by Middleberg Communications and the Society for New Communications Research (SNCR) found more than two-thirds of journalists (70%) use social networks to aid in their reporting.  That’s up from just under half (41%) in last year’s study titled “survey of media in the wired world.”  As reported in PRWeek, two thirds go to company websites (69%) or blogs (66%) while half use Wikipedia (51%) or Twitter (47%) or go to… score another one for online video (48%).  An interesting side note to this last item.  Usually I go to the originating site to verify information contained in articles, but I didn’t in this case because my web browser warned that the SNCR site was unsafe, with infections and malware.  How ironic that a media site would carry such a warning.  H

      AND THE AWARD GOES:  And goes.  And goes. To 96 different categories to be precise.  The Web Marketing Association announced the winners of its Web Award which, you will note, is singular; which may be true because there is only one winner in each category but which would seem to indicate a lack of thought.  (Sort of like me when I bought and built the website MediaConsultant.tv, singular, instead of MediaConsultants.tv, plural.)  Anyway, as part of my never-ending service to readers, visiting such places looking for nuggets that you will find useful, I can honestly say – don’t bother.  Unlike the Webby Awards noted in a previous MfM and which really did have some cool sites, only one site on the Web Marketing Association’s list elicited even the slightest ooh and aah – SciFi.com’s Warehouse 13 which won the TV category.  Okay, semi-cool was the Zimbio.com site which won the E-Zine category and which does have some interesting citizen reporting.  All right, the Leo Burnett Big Black Pencil website which won for marketing was pretty cool.  And the Charlotte Observer’s website which won in the Newspaper category wasn’t bad.  The winner of the broadcasting category, USANetwork.com, was just so-so.  The Business Week’s Business Exchange website won both in News and in Social Networking, which is pretty amazing for a site that is in Beta and looks like it’s a long way from going Alpha.  In Media, the winner was Website Magazine which isn’t half bad, while in the Magazine category the winner was DockWalk – billed as “the essential site for captains and crews.”  Actually last year’s winner in the Magazine category, Saudi Aramco World, was even more interesting.  So, I guess in the end, there were some interesting points.

      COCKTAIL CHATTER:  With all the BS about ‘government death panels,’ you might find it interesting to know there is a death panel… sort of.  It’s a website put together by researchers and students at Carnegie Mellon University.  Called deathriskrankings.com, it gives you the odds of your dying next year, or whenever, based on publicly available data.  It ranks up to 66 different possible causes of death.  Just for the record, I didn’t check on my situation.   And as someone who goes to an enormous number of websites, a cocktail chatter warning.  Avoid online surveys and do not accept offers of free ‘white papers.’  Several articles recently have warned that social networking sites have an incredible amount of surveys, with come on’s about how you can find out something about yourself or your friends.  Most, if not all, of them gather a lot of personal information in the process.  As to the ‘white paper’ offers that will show you how to Twitter, or increase your website traffic, or the results of the latest online survey or other ‘great’ pieces of information… well, be prepared.  The sales people will be a-calling.    

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