Posts Tagged "2009"
Hulu and Facebook Taking Share Away from YouTube…
Last week Mashable’s Ben Parr posted this article that made me do a double-take. The numbers speak for themselves:
YouTube’s huge lead in online video just got a little bit smaller due to surging growth from two up-and-comers in the video space: Hulu and Facebook.
Web analytics firm ComScore released their data for online video usage in October, and the numbers are astounding. While Google/YouTube (YouTube) continues to dominate with over 125 million monthly viewers (and over 1 billion views per day), both Hulu (Hulu) and Facebook (Facebook) had double-digit percentage gains, shattering their previous video records.
Online video continues to sustain its surge in growth. According to ComScore, there were 27.94 billion videos viewed in October, up a big 7% from September. Out of that, Google/YouTube is still on top with 10.52 billion videos viewed.
The big mover in October though was Hulu. In September, the News Corp/Disney/NBC joint venture delivered 583 million views. In October, that number shot up by 31.8% to a total of 855 million video views. This is by far a record for the TV video website. Most of this however can be attributed to the fall primetime season being in full swing:
In terms of unique viewers though, there wasn’t that much of a change. YouTube had 125.3 million unique viewers in October, nearly identical to its 125.5 million in September. Hulu didn’t have a lot of growth, either: 42.4 million people tuned in to the service in October, compared to 38.7 million in September.
In fact, the biggest winner seems to be Facebook. In September, it had 31.18 million unique viewers. In October, that number skyrocketed by nearly 25% to 41.15 million uniques. Once again, this is a record for the world’s largest social network, and one that speaks to how powerful Facebook is becoming in the video space.
There were some other eye-popping numbers (84.4% of U.S. Internet users watched at least one online video in October and the average person watched 10.8 hours of video), but the central theme is the same: online video continues to grow and the end is nowhere in sight.
Read MoreEveryone’s a celebrity: 10 pop culture trends that defined the decade
Celebrity is no longer reserved for the select few that walk red carpet and get stalked by paparazzi. The era of social celebrity is here and continues to draw attention. A recent CBC News post by Greig Dymond highlighted 10 terrific examples of this trend — where, thanks to social media, anyone among us can reach celebrity status.
This was the decade when everyone became a celebrity. Well, almost everyone.
The past 10 years didn’t invent the concept of celebrity; they just broadened the definition of the term to a ridiculous extent. More people than ever have achieved some minor level of notoriety. As the film The Truman Show shrewdly predicted back in 1998, voyeurism and technology are the twin engines that propelled this shift.
Just ask Richard Heene, now-famous (and infamous) father of the “balloon boy.” His story — a twisted amalgam of reality TV, fame-whoring, all-news channel coverage and breathless tweets — couldn’t have happened in quite the same way 10 years ago. The lines between entertainment, personal narrative and news have become irrevocably blurred.
Here are what he lists as the 10 pop culture trends that shaped the decade.
1. Reality TV
2. YouTube and the art of the viral video
3. Celebrity gawking, 21st-century style
4. The iPod killed the CD star
5. Newspapers in jeopardy
6. Auto-Tune
7. Twitter, Facebook and the explosion of social media
8. The rise of U.S. cable dramas
9. Guitar Hero/Rock Band
10. The rise of “fake news”
Check our the complete descriptions of each trend by reading the full article. Some video clips for each trend can be found here:
Reality TV
YouTube and the art of the viral video
The iPod killed the CD star
Auto-Tune
Guitar Hero/Rock Band
Read MoreFacebook Adding Half a Million New Users Every Day!
In a recent Mashable article, Ben Parr writes about the staggering growth of Facebook. It makes you wonder about the future of the web as we know it — will people stop building websites and focus on building facebook pages? What does this mean for the future of the web and the way that brands interact and think about their communication strategies? The numbers are staggering — and very real. The reality that brands are faced with is a dramatic change in control — from a one way “broadcasting” strategy that they used to own, to a “listening” and “engagement” strategy that requires them to provide relevant and meaningful content in order to get consumers interested in what they have to say. Without this shift in strategy they will be left without visibility and without meaning in a socially dominated world that has turned the value chain on its head.
Read MoreIt’s no secret that Facebook is humongous: 300 million users humongous. Yet it still shocks us that it keeps on finding new users to fuel its ascent into the social media stratosphere.
A little over a year ago (August 2008), Facebook (Facebook) reached 100 million users. And now according to AllFacebook, that number is now a staggering 325+ million users.
So just how fast is Facebook’s userbase growing? We sat down and did the math. First, here are Facebook’s major growth milestones, starting from when it reached 100 million users:
– August 26th, 2008: 100 million users
– January 7th, 2009: 150 million users
– April 8th, 2009: 200 million users
– July 15th, 2009: 250 million users
– September 15th, 2009: 300 million users
– Friday, November 6th, 2009: 325 million usersHalf a Million New Users. Every Single Day.
So let’s do the math. From September 15th to November 6th, Facebook grew by 25 million users. That’s 53 days, if we include the start and end days. Divide that by 25 million and you get a daily growth rate of 471,698 users per day for Facebook. That’s a small city joining Facebook every single day.
Even more shocking is that the number used to be higher. Between July 15th and September 15th, 63 days, Facebook grew by 50 million users. If we do the math, Facebook was growing at a clip of 793,650 users per day. We’re barely able to come up with the words to describe this type of growth.
The Facebook train has to eventually slow down; there are only so many people on planet Earth with an Internet connection (yes, that’s how big their potential audience is), and it seems to be already slowing. However, if you consider half a million users per day “slowing,” then you know you’ve done something right.
This train’s going towards the sky for a good, long time.
About Me
Proud father, devoted husband, Founder and Chief Creative Officer of Big Fuel, a full-service marketing and communications company based in New York that takes brands from Content To Commerce.
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