Internet Will Replace TV?

So you’ve heard about people who’ve dumped traditional TV in favor of watching complete episodes of their favorite shows online at such free sites as hulu.com.

What you may not realize is the trend is toward more Internet time at the expense of television, whether it’s digital or analog. TV, as we know it, may be just another fading format.

What leads WMB to that conclusion? Based on a research survey by Forrester, the average U.S. consumer now spends as much time online as watching television. A tipping point toward online could be on the horizon.

The online/TV statistic marks a big shift for the United States at large; this is the first year in Forrester’s survey that people have reported spending equal amounts of time on the two activities — 13 hours a week, the Wall Street Journal reports.

It’s not because people are spending less time watching TV; those numbers have remained about the same. It’s because Internet usage has grown so dramatically — 121 percent in the past five years.

We, at WMB, suspect many of us have shifted our daily habits and routines. More online time means less time for radio listening, reading books, magazines and newspapers offline, exercising, going outdoors and, sadly, quality face time with family and friends.

The authors of this free blog admit being in the same trap: It takes time to develop quality posts on a variety of topics, get the facts, the links and photos, and then package it three times a week. It’s a labor of love, but it comes at a price – free time to do other things.

And, let’s face the ugly truth, being online is pretty much a solitary activity, even if you have a zillion friends on Facebook and e-mail everyone on your Yahoo address list. It’s just you and the keypad – desktop, laptop, smartphone, netbook, whatever your communication device of choice.

E-commerce and social networking have seen the biggest rise in popularity since 2007, Forrester’s survey of more than 40,000 people shows.

Three years ago, about a third of Americans shopped online, and now nearly two thirds do. About 35% of people visit social-networking sites like Facebook regularly, up from 15% in 2007.

Even the things generating the loudest buzz (or trend hype?) in the tech world — microblogging services such as Twitter and streaming radio like Pandora — haven’t fired up the imagination of the online crowd.

Reading blogs is something done by only 18% of people, according Forrester. So, if you’re reading this, consider yourself in the minority!

“The reality is these activities will never have the mass appeal of something like e-mail,” which is used by 92% of people, writes Forrester researcher Jacqueline Anderson in the report. Her theory is that people are most likely to adopt technology that fills a general need and fits easily with other things they were doing anyway.

Though WMB doesn’t conduct surveys, we use Google Analytics to measure our viewership’s interests (which led us to introduce ChinaWatch, WMB's weekly digest of news from China, as a regular feature).

We suspect, however unscientific, many of you watch TV on digital flat screen or analog sets as you travel online via laptop or desktop in the comfort of your home. It’s a natural fit because it puts you in the cockpit of information.

For example, you could be watching Anderson Cooper’s TV news reports on CNN while checking out breaking sports news on espn.com, a form of personal multi-tasking that immerses you in need-to-know developments.

Yes, you could toggle between the CNN and ESPN TV channels with your remote, but what fun would that be, unless you did that while texting?

Seriously, based on a combination of price and convenience, the day may come when you find just one information and entertainment format works best – and that’s online. Given the tech advances of last decade, that day may be closer than we all realize.

As for me, I practice what I preach at writenowworks.com. If you like this post, please share it.

Golden Grid Gadgets Going Green

Electronics are trending “green” with California leading the way by proposing a mandatory energy restriction on TVs to be sold in the Golden State.

The green aspects of consumer electronics have entered a new paradigm and could be enacted as early as this year, according to the California Energy Commission.

The law would affect TVs manufactured after 2011. And, as of Jan. 1, 2013, California power consumption must be reduced by over 30 percent.

The mandates basically follow the Energy Star guidelines, described at Wikipedia as international standards for energy efficient consumer products. Energy Star began as a U.S. government program under the Clinton administration in 1992.

California wants to change the guidelines from goals to mandatory requirements, but the effort has some TV makers nervous because they’re not sure how it will affect their bottom line.

For state-of-the art technologies such as OLED, AM OLED, 3D TV, and Internet TV, these requirements probably are satisfied. For other technologies, any additional electronics can be engineered to be disabled and the measurements performed in 2D mode.

Looking forward, the 2010 Greener Gadgets Conference will be held next month in New York City. The conference, now in its third year according to greenergadget.com, demonstrates companies’ leadership and commitment to sustainability, green practices and innovation.

The gathering connects leaders in the consumer electronics industry with thought leaders from the design and green business worlds, engineers, students, press and investors in a setting in the media center of New York City. Major corporations throughout the world attend the conference, born out of the Consumer Electronics Association.

The 2010 event will benchmark plans for an entire green lifestyle beginning in the place you start every day. A panel session entitled “Green Living Begins at Home” will outline how a green home also can be a smart home, whether it’s in an urban or rural location, on or off the power grid.

Keynoters will include Yves Behar, founder of the San Francisco design studio, fuseproject, and Robert Fabricant, vice president of creative for frog design inc.

Behar’s studio was responsible for the design of the world’s first $100 “XO” laptop for “One Laptop Per Child,” a project aimed at bringing education and technology to the world’s poorest children. Fabricant leads frog’s Design for Impact initiatives that focus on using mobile technologies to increase access to information and accelerate positive behavior change.

The conference closes with the incredibly popular Greener Gadgets Design Competition, highlighting a new class of sustainable product concepts, from those that create their own energy to those that minimize the need for any electricity.

We believe this conference and others like it will continue to prosper throughout the world as the search intensifies for “cleaner electrons” with the aim of transforming them from black to green.

Note: This post came to We Mean Business from TechMan who monitors industry trends.