Figures released today by the BBC show that iPlayer requests soared 29% (to 187m pm) between Dec 10 and Dec 11. That’s almost 2b in 2011 as a whole. But what was really interesting was the devices used to access the service. Although c66% still watch on their PCs, the really remarkable growth was on mobiles (13m in Dec 11 and up 163% yoy), connected TVs (7m – up c1000% yoy) and tablets (10m – up c600% yoy). This really echoes our family – where iPlayer on the iPad is a particular hit. I assume that iPlayer will work on the Amazon Fire. See e-readers and tablets rule this Christmas. In which case, I can see another boost to iPlayer usage when the Fire is released in the UK.
As readers know, I really believe that this will also be the year when ‘Connected TVs’ really take off – See ARM backs the right horse. Son of iPlayer – YouView – is set to be a major reason for people to choose to go down that route. Apple’s entry into that market will also be a major spur.
Which all leaves the poor old PC/laptop rather languishing unloved – literally left ‘on the shelf’ in our case! These figures really do show how fast the model is changing with quite disastrous consequences for those not ‘playing’ in the fastest growing segments.