Video Streams Get Too Much Love
On Friday, NewTeeVee released a set of comScore VideoMetrix data. The day before, they released information from Nielsen. As fascinating as some may find this information, I find it severely lacking for anyone who actually works in the digital media space. So often nowadays information is released for the sake of generating interest or buzz. It may help to excite some media organizations, or lead others to ponder what (if any) changes should be made, but I don’t believe such data can boil down to real value.
comScore and Nielsen make it their business to act as an impartial provider of key information, but their digital media-oriented reports seem to ignore perspective. Looking back at January’s VideoMetrix data, I ask why anyone would compare video streams across Yahoo! properties to those of Turner Networks or Fox Interactive Media; such comparisons only purpose is to solicit reactions of other properties. In other words, “look how fast Hulu’s audience is growing,” or that “Google is still king.”
It’s time to bring relevance back to various video metrics. There must be a call for action to not only create useful comparisons between providers’ individual sites, but to also no longer assume that all streams are created equal.