Cable and broadcast networks are clearly not planning to be passive couch potatoes while tablets and the Internet steal eyeballs and advertising dollars. Walt Disney’s ABC is the latest media giant to acknowledge the shifting landscape; the network will reportedly launch an app that will stream live network programming to tablets and smartphones. According to The New York Times, the streaming content would be available to cable and satellite subscribers.
Cable operators are also working to ensure that the move to streaming video does not undermine their business. Time Warner Cable will stream 300 channels to TV sets through Roku boxes, which connect TVs to the Internet. The deal means viewers will not be using Time Warner’s cable service when they watch via Roku, but Time Warner could still require them to be subscribers in order to access Roku’s Time Warner channels. And viewers will still be using their television sets, meaning that they can switch over to traditional cable at any time. This is much more palatable for cable operators than is the alternative – viewers who are watching TV shows on a tablet or PC.
“Cord cutters,” or households that do not use TV sets to get video content from outside the home, now represent roughly 5% of all U.S. households. TV rating agency Nielsen says that there are now more than 5 million “Zero-TV” households in America, up from just over 2 million in 2007. Nielsen noted that most of these “cord cutters” still own a TV, but they use it primarily for watching DVRs. Advertiser-supported content and subscription content is viewed on PCs, tablets and smartphones.
A recent study by Viacom found that 15% of full-length TV show viewing now occurs on tablets. Ther perecentages are even higher when it comes to news viewing, with 37% of adults now getting their daily news from a tablet, according to Pew Research.
Most major cable and broadcast networks already have mobile apps that let users of iOS and Android devices stream some content. But so far none of the major networks has offered the ability to stream live content; ABC would be the first. News content is one of the key types of programming that viewers want to watch live, particularly local weather and traffic news. So ABC will need to negotiate with its local affiliates to secure their participation in its newest digital offering.
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