Is YouTube Finally Overtaking FreeTV?
YouTube reports that it’s getting 100 million video streamings per day. These are mostly “bite-sized” snippets of videos.
Since springing from out of nowhere late last year, YouTube has come to hold the leading position in online video with 29 percent of the U.S. multimedia entertainment market, according to the latest weekly data from Web measurement site Hitwise.
YouTube videos account for 60 percent of all videos watched online, the company said. Videos are delivered free on YouTube and the company is still working on developing advertising and other means of generating revenue to support the business.
Incidentally, during the same period, television viewership seems to have declined.
CBS, ABC, NBC and Fox averaged 20.8 million viewers during the average prime-time minute last week, according to Nielsen Media Research. That sunk below the previous record, set during the last week of July in 2005.
It wasn’t entirely unexpected. By tradition, the week that includes Independence Day has the fewest viewers of the year, or close to it, because rerun season is in full swing and the public is consumed with outdoor activities.
It’s either people are going out more with this summer season, or they’re resorting to alternative sources of entertainment, such as the ‘Net. When YouTube started out last year, I didn’t think it would be as popular as it is now. I thought it would be just another one of those short-lived web apps. Even with Google’s launch of its own video service, YouTube has stood strong. Perhaps it’s the community aspect of the service that made it so popular. According to Forevergeek, YouTube is actually now among the Web’s most popular destinations, even surpassing MySpace.
Is YouTube really worth the $1 billion price tag people are attributing to the video service?
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Is YouTube Finally Overtaking FreeTV?
nice..
Trackback by sstaniford0001 — August 3, 2006 @ 5:14 pm
[…] I also believe that we’ll see product placement advertising on a new scale. By product placement I don’t mean that we’ll see things show up for a minute or two, but rather that the marketing agencies will represent the new studios. Using Microsoft’s training video as a good example, they were able to create a very entertaining branded experience with limited expenses. While the production quality might not be good enough for TV, with people being used to that amateur quality on YouTube, I believe that the quality of this video is fantastic for the internet. Because Microsoft didn’t have to worry about making distribution agreements with the cable companies, the studios, the satellite providers, etc., they were able to focus on making a quick funny video and could then release it inexpensively on the net for anyone to see. As online video continues to gain in popularilty, I believe that more companies will begin making their own original content above and beyond the long form commercials that we’ve seen to date. It may take time for the marketing agencies to catch onto this trend and it may take time to convince more companies to engage in marketing this way, but it’s not far fetched to think that Microsoft could create their own version of The Office and have it be a hit online. If your production cost are controlled by cheap cameras and cheap editing software, a single company could produce an entire sitcom with a tenth of the expense of what it costs to make television today. While YouTube currently is the leader in online video sharing, the first one to enable companies to broadcast directly to the TV will be a huge winner in the future of ad supported television. […]
Pingback by Davis Freeberg’s Digital Connection » Blog Archive » Microsoft Leads Advertising Revolution With Employee Training Video — August 21, 2006 @ 7:27 pm