Internet TV – the (legal?) show everyone’s watching

By Alex Zaharov-Reutt
Thursday, 22 May 2008 16:50

Opinion and Analysis

With an apparent desire for “one digital media box to rule them all”, Internet video has finally come of age, according to Cisco, showing Internet video is highly popular in Australia and NZ. What are we watching?

If illegal TV show and movie downloads are a part of the online diet of the 1000 people in Cisco’s “Connected Consumer” survey across Australia and New Zealand, we’ll never know, because global research Illuminas didn’t seem to ask that question.

Yet while Australia is branded the biggest TV pirating nation on Earth, we can only assume that if the question of illegal video downloads was asked – and was truthfully answered – Internet video usage would have skyrocketed even more than the amazing 59% it has already reached in both countries amongst regular Internet users.

In total, the 1000 people surveyed comprised 864 Australians and 219 New Zealanders in November 2007. Not a massively huge sample size if you ask me, but then I’m not a research expert, and I guess there was a budget Cisco allotted which Illuminas must have had to work towards.

Anyway, the sample size being what it is, the results are nevertheless quite interesting. A typical week in the life of an Internet user in both countries would see each individual spending a whopping 47 hours in “media related activities” in the home, split up as 22 hours of Internet media use and 14 hours watching TV.

That means more time being entertained each week in some form than is spent in a “regular” 40 hour work week, although the Internet does make it easy for some of those meant to be working spending at least some of that time sneaking a peek of the latest Internet videos. What the precise cross-over is, however, is unknown.

That 47 hours of cross media consumption for Aussies and Kiwis equals the usage seen in the USA and the United Kingdom, meaning we match our first world cousins in entertainment consumption, with the split slightly different in the US (21 hours Internet use in the US and presumable then 15 hours of TV), while the UK sees the same 22 hours of Internet media consumption usage.

Cisco says the survey its “one of the first of its kind” in the region, which seems to suggest it isn’t the first, but simply the latest, and suggests that us down under types “are interested in the concept of a single platform for storing and managing their digital content”.

So, what precise types of Internet media are we said to be consuming in Australia and NZ, and what questions and answers drew Cisco and Illuminas to the conclusion that we want one digital media box to rule them all?

Please read on to page 2 where I also link to some of Australia's major free, legal video watching and downloading sites!