MORE PEOPLE WATCHING VIDEO ON PC’S — IN PRIMETIME

While the conventional wisdom until now has been that the use of personal computers poses little threat to conventional TV because people are able to use them and watch TV simultaneously — and do — new studies now indicate that more and more people are watching video online during the primetime period — something that they cannot readily do and watch broadcast or cable TV at the same time. The Wall Street Journal reported today (Wednesday) that several video websites are reporting a shift in online viewing from daytime periods to primetime. That change in viewing habits, the newspaper observed, “signals that Internet video providers could eventually lure people away from traditional television.” Competition from online video is likely to grow as TV manufacturers increasingly build online capabilities into their sets. “The moment we start doing more primetime Internet video viewing on the TV, then Internet video is actually competing with old-school television,” James McQuivey, an analyst at Forrester Research, told the Journal.