The gender mix of online video viewers in the US skews toward women by 55% to 45%, according to a May 2008
Nielsen study. This was almost exactly the same split as the US home TV viewing population, but the opposite of the mobile video universe, which leaned toward males by a similar margin.
A comScore study confirmed additional Nielsen findings for “light” and “medium” online video streamers, but found that “heavy” streamers—those in the top 20% of the usage pool—were predominantly male by about a 6-to-4 margin.
Interestingly, when comScore’s survey sample was stripped of the “light,” “medium” and “heavy” usage designations, the resulting total was a dead-even split between men and women who streamed video.
As with other examples of disparities between Nielsen and comScore figures, this one could be explained by differences in survey panels. Since comScore includes university locations and Nielsen does not, a greater incidence of males among college-age online video viewers would account for the discrepancy.
Approximately 80% of the US online population now watches online video at least once a month, consuming everything from news clips to college humor to sports highlights to full-length TV episodes. Not surprisingly, age patterns are all over the map, in contrast to other Web 2.0 activities such as social networking, which still appeal mainly to core youth audiences.
The age diversity of online video viewers is reflected in a July 2008 Nielsen study that showed a fairly even distribution by age among the US audience. Although a combined 39% of US viewers were under age 35, the single largest cluster of users was in the 45-to-54-year-old cohort. Older users were also well-represented, with a combined 22% ages 55 and older.
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