Consumer knowledge of personal video recorders (PVRs) is increasing, with 88% of US adults aware of the technology, up from 74% in 2004, according to a survey from the Leichtman Group.
A similar study from Find/SVP shows that PVR penetration in the US is around 15%, with time shifting the most commonly sited benefit of PVR use, followed by the ability to skip commercials.
Commenting on the results, Ben Macklin, senior analyst at eMarketer said: “Like many disruptive technologies, the impact of PVRs was over estimated in the short term and perhaps underestimated in the long term.”
He added: “PRV adoption has been relatively slow, considering the technology has been around since the late 1990s, but all indications suggest PRV technology will be a mainstream product/service by 2010.”
Speaking at the Edinburgh TV Festival, Dr Robert Pepper, senior managing director of global advanced technology policy at Cisco Systems, claimed that PVRs are significantly changing the way in which people watch television, with 5% of current TV viewing in the US time-shifted, predicted to rise to 10% by the end of next year and 25% by 2008 (see Quarter Of US Consumers Forecast To Time-Shift By 2008).
Previous industry opinion was that PVRs would cause a severe threat to advertisers, with viewers using the devices to skip through a large proportion of adverts. Recent research from Accenture predicts that nearly 10% of all television commercials will be skipped by 2009 due to the fast forwarding technology (see US Advertisers To Lose 10% Of Commercial Impacts By 2009).
However, advertisers are being sent mixed signals over the dangers of PVR uptake. US studies from Frank N.Magid Associates claim that despite advertisers’ fears of TV adverts being skipped with the new technology, 55% of PVR users stop to watch adverts that catch their eye (see Strong Growth For Entertainment Industry Led By Online Games).
New research from ESPN agrees with this, claiming that the majority of PVR households in the US are relatively new to the technology, with the devices not yet affecting their television viewing behaviour (see PVRs Not Yet Affecting TV Viewing Behaviour).
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