M+E Daily
Nine out 10 U.S. Consumers Pay for TV Service: Nielsen
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Even with the rise of Internet and mobile video — and television ownership down — the overall number of U.S. households paying for TV services has held steady over the past year, research firm Nielsen maintains in a new report.
Some 91 percent of consumers pay for cable, satellite, or telco-provided TV service as of the first quarter of 2011, Nielsen says. In addition, overall TV viewership increased by 22 minutes per month per person from last year.
Just last month, Nielsen reported the first decline in television ownership among U.S. consumers in the past 20 years. Among the contributing factors: “a small subset of younger, urban consumers” seemed to favor watching TV programming via computers and mobile devices.
But while it avoids any mention of “cord-cutting” in its new report, Nielsen now says that the heaviest at-home viewers of streaming video content — led by those ages 18-34 — watch less traditional TV than the general population, while the lightest TV watchers stream more.
For now, “cord cutting” seems to consist mostly of cable TV subscribers switching to either satellite or telco TV service (via the Los Angeles Times).
Nielsen posits a coexistence between traditional TV and streaming among most households. “Though we’re seeing strong growth for mobile and Internet video, traditional TV remains dominant,” says Matt O’Grady, the research firm’s EVP of media audience measurement. “Each month, U.S. consumers spent nearly 159 hours viewing TV in their homes, four and a half hours viewing Internet video on their computer, and more than four hours watching video on their mobile devices.”
