TV offline viewership may be down, but online viewers still enjoy the tube
(CBS/What's Trending) - According to Nielsen Company, the primary source of rating all things television, TV ownership is down for the first time since 1992.
What does that mean exactly? Is having a flat LCD or plasma panel across from the couch what defines television? Or, does this decline in the ownership of single-purpose screens signify a shift of another kind?
As I look at how I watch television, I'm inclined to think Nielsen is using the wrong measuring stick. Most of my television viewing happens on an iMac connected to my Xfinity cable service. I have a coworker who watches Hulu Plus through an Xbox 360, connected to a projecter. I watch Netflix on my iPad. All of these acts could easily be defined as "watching television" without using the traditional living room screen for viewing.
Rather than declining, television has evolved. We are no longer limited to a single screen connected to a cable box somewhere in the house. I carry television in my pocket with movie and episodic rentals on my iPhone. The HDTV screen in my house became a computer monitor years ago, as a way to monitor my own live streaming video.
What about you? Have you stopped watching television? Or have you changed the way you watch?
Chris Pirillo is a geek, internet entrepreneur, hardware addict, software junkie, book author, technology enthusiast, early adopter, idea evangelist, bootstrapper and thicker quicker picker upper. He's also a weekly columnist for What's Trending. To read more about him, click here.