Despite the exploding popularity of online video, a new study suggests that the future of news only has a small online video component. The online study from The Pew Research Center's Project for Excellence in Journalism said online video ranks low with users on nearly all 25 sites included in the study, with only CNN and CBS News scoring significant video views, and the study says the CBS News views may have ben skewed by a single event.
"Another finding was that the data suggest that news online remains a heavily text-oriented environment. Online video did not rank high on any of the sites as a place that people clicked to--even on the sites whose legacy product is affiliated with television, except CBSNews.com," said the report.
"Of the top 25 sites, five come from outlets associated with video (television): FoxNews.com, CNN.com, MSNBC.com, ABCNews.com, and CBSNews.com. But online video was only one of the top 20 pages viewed on two of those, CNN.com where it ranked second and CBSNews.com where it ranked first. In short, despite strong growth in online video, video remains a small, and in comparison with text, a distant part of the appeal of the Web, even on outlets whose legacy format is visual."
In June, Pew reported that online video use was surging, with more than half of all adults in the United States saying they have watched or downloaded online video; that number reaches nearly 70 percent among adult Internet users. The report, based on telephone interviews by Princeton Survey Research Associates of 1,005 adults 18 and older, said more than 61 percent of the views came on sites like YouTube.
For more:
- see the study
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