Traditional TV
Overall TV viewership increased 22 minutes per month per person over last year, remaining the dominant source of video content for all demographics. In addition, Nielsen data shows that consumers are willing to pay for high-quality TV content, with broadcast-only homes less than a tenth of U.S. TV households.

Mobile Video
Though still accounting for just a handful of hours per month, mobile video viewing continues to see marked gains, increasing 41 percent over last year and more than 100 percent since 2009.

Timeshifted TV
Timeshifted TV continues to grow, both in the penetration of DVR devices in the home and the time spent.

Internet Video
Internet video streaming also saw increases in time spent; this behavior is the highest among a younger and diverse subset of the population.

More details are available to download in the complete Cross-Platform Report.

Emerging Traditional TV/In-home Internet Streaming Trend
Until the fall of 2010, Nielsen data consistently indicated that the heaviest media consumers are so across all platforms. A subset of consumers from television and Internet homes has now emerged that defies that notion, with the lightest traditional television users streaming significantly more Internet video, and the heaviest streamers under-indexing for traditional TV viewership.

This behavior is led by those ages 18-34.  The group of consumers exhibiting this behavior is significant but small. More than a third of the TV/Internet population is not streaming, whereas less than 1% are not watching TV.

For more in-depth information on overall viewing behavior—by ethnicity, gender and age—as well as emerging trends and device and delivery penetration, download Cross-Platform Report.

As a way to help get better answers for media companies and advertisers, and to begin to establish a standard metric for game play that can be compared to other media measurement, The Nielsen Company teamed up with Microsoft and conducted a pilot study that took a closer look at the video game-playing audience. Initial findings from the study were presented at this week’s Ad:Tech conference.

To get a clearer picture of who’s playing what, when, and for how long, watermarks were placed in Season 2 of the Xbox LIVE game “1 vs 100.” Using the same Nielsen panel used to measure TV, we were able to draw comparisons between a video game audience and a TV audience. For example, while Nielsen’s Video Game Play metrics can provide a snapshot of who’s playing a specific console, the addition of the watermark provided the ability to get specific audience data on a title-level.

The consumption of Xbox 360 console usage minutes by 18-34 year olds is generally 45 percent. When looking at the gamer profile for Xbox LIVE’s “1 vs 100” game show, 18-34 year olds made up 55 percent of the player set. These specific metrics help to provide the type of insights advertisers and media planners need to compare video game platforms to other types of media.

Nielsen data for the Xbox 360 shows that month-to-month, between 20-25 percent of Xbox 360 consoles are active during prime time hours in Nielsen homes. With the Xbox 360 being a multimedia device capable of not only playing games, but also movies, TV content, music, and social media interaction via Facebook and Twitter, the need to measure all of its capabilities has been a popular client request.

Time Spent Playing
The Nielsen and Microsoft joint study evaluated 13 weeks of programming from November 2009 through February 2010. The Xbox LIVE game show “1 vs 100” was available for play in two forms, “1 vs 100 Live” in which a live host, Chris Cashman, provided commentary and real prizes were awarded, as well as “1 vs 100 Extended Play,” where players could practice in more condensed, theme-based versions of the show.

Based on panel and meter date, the average length of play for “1 vs 100” (both Live and Extended Play sessions combined) is more than 70 minutes. More impressively, , the average length of play during “1 vs 100 Live” is87 minutes. Both types of play offer advertising integration during the “game breaks” after each set of 10 questions.

“Advertisers should be very interested to see the amount of time consumers spend interacting with these games – especially during those appointment-based ‘1 vs 100 Live’ sessions,” said Gerardo Guzman, Nielsen Games. “What makes this pilot study so important is the potential for precise audience segmenting. As more game companies and advertisers participate in studies like these, we’re able to define and refine an efficient set of metrics for gaming that can be compared against other media.”

“Our independent research shows that gamers are very engaged while playing, especially during Live Play,” said Carolyn Fuson, Sr. Audience and Analysis Manager, Xbox LIVE Advertising. “In one specific case, an advertiser who placed ads within the games saw notable brand recall and lift. Our ability to learn more about the audience can only be a positive to those brands looking to make an impact on the growing gaming community.”

“The Fourth Screen Network Audience Report” is Nielsen’s first ever syndicated report that measures the rapidly growing industry of location-based video media. The inaugural report measures ad exposures by 10 video networks in venues like movie theaters, bars and restaurants, health clubs, gas stations, and hotels. Measurements were taken over the last four months of 2009.

The report finds that 54% of the 237 million monthly exposures to persons 18+ were displayed to male audiences , with 46% exposed to females. An estimated 50% of all the monthly exposures were displayed to men and women in the key 18-34 demographic.

This is the first time that any measurement company has provided a comprehensive, standardized audience reporting that allows advertisers to easily compare data from these networks with measurements from the other three screens: TV, Internet, and Mobile.

“For the first time, ad buyers and sellers have a single source to evaluate digital place-based advertising networks in reaching key age and sex demographics, and compare these to other video sources such as TV,” said Terrie Brennan, SVP for New Business Development at Nielsen. “This syndicated report provides the insight necessary to understand the impact of advertising on these networks with television and Internet as well as other cross-media campaigns.”

For example, the C3 average audience for a primetime broadcast TV commercial was three million viewers age 18+ in October 2009. During that same period, video ad exposures to NCM’s and Screenvision’s movie theater networks combined for an average 61.7 million, meaning that it took about 20 primetime ads to reach the same audience as a typical month-long advertising flight on both movie theater networks.

For more information on the report, please see the full press release from Nielsen.

With a focus on information and irreverence, Mediaweek has launched MediaFreakBlog.com, joining sister sites Adfreak and Brandfreak. Jim Cooper, Executive Editor, AdweekMedia and editor of Mediafreak explains the strategy behind Nielsen’s most recent blog offering.

What’s the goal of Mediafreak?
Jim Cooper: Mediaweek’s mantra has always been cover the content and follow the dollars, and Mediafreak will operate under the same mission-just in blog form. Our staff writers and freelance contributors will bring their deep institutional knowledge to bear to deliver an insightful, informative and entertaining counterpart to Mediaweek and Mediaweek.com.

Who is the audience? Is it broader than Mediaweek?
JC: Mediafreak is designed to appeal to a wide ranging audience of media professionals as well as a consumer and enthusiast audience interested in all things television, publishing and digital media.

How does it differ from the other blogs, Adfreak and Brandfreak?
JC: Mediafreak will solely cover the ad-support media business and, with our writers expertise and personalities, will be both distinct from and complimentary to its sister blogs.

Are you going to break news or is it largely to riff on the news?
JC: We will break news on Mediaweek.com and use Mediafreak as place where that news can be looked at through the prisms of context, insight, humor, outrage and a dash of snark — but we don’t want it to be gratuitously nasty in tone. We hope the blog will diversify our coverage of the media industry.

Brandfreak has an obsession with the brand Snuggies, what are some likely targets in Mediafreak articles?
JC: Well, we’ll always keep an eye on the general ad marketplace throughout the year, but issues like the future of media measurement and transition from traditional media to digital will always be broad themes behind our filings. The uncertain future of magazines, local broadcasting and newspapers will be ripe fruit for us to pluck as well. But the media industry is a vast waterfront to cover and fodder for Mediafreak will range from riffs on TV Land’s reality series The Cougar to insight on Supreme Court rulings. We’ll try to get freaky with it all.

Visit: Meadifreakblog.com

“Our work with IMMI shows that TV usage out of the home is a big component of video consumption, which Nielsen clients want to incorporate into their advertising negotiations. Nielsen is continuing to explore ways to accurately measure out of home video consumption, to provide a more complete picture of how people are watching TV. And because of the current economic conditions we are focusing our efforts on a service that will be valuable and economical to the industry,” says Marie Philippe, program manager of Out of Home measurement for The Nielsen Company.

More at MediaWeek.

Read Nielsen’s Out Of Home Viewing report.