Alex Zaharov-Reutt
Wednesday, 12 March 2008 13:25
Opinion and Analysis
Page 1 of 4
AVRRA, the Australian Video Rental Retailers Association, says online
movie downloads are a ‘tough sell’, referencing a Diffusion Group
survey of 1,975 US broadband users claiming that only 9.5% say they
regularly download movies. However, there is evidence to suggest that the results are skewed.
It appears the Diffusion Group only asked about legal movie download services, surely making the survey and its subsequent US $2500 report potentially meaningless if you really want to know just how popular all types of movie downloads are.
”Lies, damned lies, statistics and surveys” so my amended version of the famous saying goes: if you ask the right questions, fail to ask the right questions, or ask questions that people won’t respond honestly to, you can have your survey generate whatever results you want, with the latest from the Diffusion Group on broadband and movie downloads seemingly a prime candidate.
AVRRA, the Australian Video Rental Retailers Association, is the industry body for Australia’s video and DVD rental industry and represents more than 60% of all video libraries in Australia, so when they issue a press release on movie downloads, it’s noteworthy because of who they are, but also because downloads are an obvious threat to the video rental business.
AVRRA’s
press release quotes a US research firm,
The Diffusion Group, whose new survey on US broadband users, according to AVRRA, “reveals that the market for downloading feature-length movies is nearly non-existent. Fewer than 9.5% of broadband users surveyed regularly downloaded movies.”
AVRRA say the survey is quoted in a 5th of March 2008 article in the US ‘Home Media Magazine’
website, and after looking through their recent stories, we found a very similar quote in an
article from the 10th of March, 2008 talking about Lionsgate joining Apple’s iTunes movie download service.
Doing a bit of research, we found the
press release from The Diffusion Group (TDG), and the précis of their actual US $2500
report which the quote comes from.
In the TDG press release, Michael Greeson, president of TDG and author of the new report said that "Online movie services have to date failed to gain a critical mass of users. Even Steve Jobs recently noted that Apple, among others, has failed to figure out what combination of features will prove sufficiently compelling to consumers."
TDG’s press release says that: “Despite the presence of strong brand names such as Apple and the innovative services of start-ups such as Vudu, only 10% of adult broadband users have used an online download service either to rent or purchase movies (most of whom do so infrequently). The challenge, notes Greeson, is not only to increase familiarity with OMD (online movie download) services, but to make sure that when consumers do visit an OMD site that they find high-quality content and a set of compelling features free from the complexities and hassles of traditional web media sites.”
So, why have AVRRA jumped on this quote as evidence that consumers find movie downloads ‘a tough sell’ – and why does a lack of visibility into pirate p2p downloads of movies potentially make the report’s findings a potentially unreliable barometer by which to make any claims about consumer happiness with downloading? Please read onto page 2.
