Week of March 9, 2009

Sunny Forecast for Blu-ray

Friday, March 13, 2009

We recently discussed a dramatic drop-off in DVD sales. Well, it appears that Blu-ray is quickly picking up some of the slack. UK-based market research firm, Futuresource Consulting, is estimating that consumers in the U.S., Western Europe and Japan will purchase a combined 100 million Blu-ray Disc titles in 2009, of which about 80 million are expected to be sold in the US alone. 24 million Blu-ray discs were sold in the US in 2008, compared with only 9 million sold in Western Europe.

Futuresource is forecasting accelerating growth of the format, even in the face of the worldwide economic downturn. They're also predicting that by 2012, about half of all US video disc sales and a third of Western Europe disc sales will be Blu-ray.

More on Nielsen's TV Viewing Study

Thursday, March 12, 2009

As we mentioned last time, Nielsen has just released a study of TV viewing that shows Americans are watching more TV than ever, but with a viewing profile that's bending more and more to the latest in online and mobile technologies. In fact, mobile video increased by an impressive 9% from the previous quarter. As expected, youth dominates this segment. Teens watch about 6 1/2 hours of mobile video a month, while 18-24's watch about 3 hours.

Traditional TV viewing, of course, skews the other way. Teens spend about 103 hours each month watching video on a TV. On the other hand, seniors watch 207 hours - almost 7 hours a day - of TV every month.

TV Time Increases

Wednesday, March 11, 2009

Nielsen has just released a study of TV viewing that shows Americans are watching more TV than ever, but the profile of that viewing is skewing more towards new media. According to the Nielsen report, the average American watches more than 151 hours of TV per month, an all-time and an increase of 3.6% from the 145 hours that they watched in the same period a year ago.

What's interesting is the data on new media TV consumption: an extra three hours on the Internet for people who watch online video, and four hours on cell phones for those who watch mobile video, according to Nielsen.

Here's how various key demographics break down on their usage of online viewing:

• A18-24 - Five hours
• A 25-34 - Just over 4 hours
• A 35-44 - 3 hours, 20 minutes
• A 45-54 - 2 hours and 34 minutes

More specifics on this study tomorrow.

Beatles Rock Band Release Is Set

Tuesday, March 10, 2009

MTV Games and Harmonix game studio have announced that the Beatles-themed version of the "Rock Band" music video game will be released worldwide on Sept. 9, 2009, marking the first time that the Beatles music has been released in digital form of any kind. "The Beatles: Rock Band" will be available for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and Nintendo Wii for $59. Guitar controllers "modeled after instruments used by John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr" will sell for $99 each.

Other, unspecified exclusive content created by Apple Corps, MTV Games and Harmonix will also be made available to fans over the next few months who participate in a pre-order campaign through major retailers.

More on Yahoo Search with Video & Images

Monday, March 9, 2009

Last time we talked about Yahoo's move to add images and videos to its paid search. The initial field tests show a small video link included in the blue paid search result, along with the traditional text results. Users can click the link, which expands into a viewable video widget. Click here to see it for yourself.

The other change for Yahoo is its business model. Yahoo is charging a monthly fee for the service, versus the auction-based pricing of search advertising. For now, Yahoo will only offer this service to large consumer brands. So far, companies that have participated in the pilot program include Pedigree, SoBe, Pepsi and Home Depot.