2012 Global Digital Media - Entertainment a Key Online Activity

BuddeComm’s annual publication Global Digital Media – Entertainment a Key Online Activity, gives the latest insights into the popular online entertainment sector. The report includes broad statistical information and insights into internet media trends with a focus on the key sectors of video media, social networking, digital music and online gaming and gambling.

It provides insight into the impact on traditional media, the importance of advertising to the online sector and emerging trends like cloud computing. The report also includes a unique perspective into how the online entertainment sector is unfolding differently around the world by incorporating regional overviews written by BuddeComm’s senior analysts.

As we have been predicting for several years, the future of the digital media is very much revolving around video-based services. Video applications over broadband have emerged over the last few years as Internet media companies and content producers seek to exploit the added speed and capacity of broadband infrastructure. The killer application on these networks is video based communication, often produced by users themselves.

Users want to share their interests with like-minded people and this is creating an enormous number of niche markets – many based simply on free sharing, others on small charges, while others are managed by commercial organisations, earning their revenues from advertising and marketing activities.

In 2012 social networks are aggressively positioning their sites as a link between consumers and merchants. Both fixed and mobile social networks now tend to market themselves as a tool for merchants to connect with consumers and promote brands – rather than just as services for connecting friends.

Facebook remains the global social media leader and while it has managed to capture the largest share of the market in recent years, the industry is not sitting still and new social networks continue to emerge that aim to improve upon the originals models or introduce new concepts, such a Foursquare, Instagram and Pinterest.

In addition, online gaming, particularly social gaming is becoming increasingly popular. Facebook is well positioned in this area too, offering popular games such as Zynga’s Farmville and Words with Friends. Cloud-gaming is emerging with the launch of BT’s OnLive service.

The trend towards digital music continues unabated and now accounts for over 30% of global music revenues. While Apple iTunes remains an industry leader; it now operates in a more competitive environment with Spotify, Deezer, Grooveshark and Amazon online music just some of the players vying for position. Using cloud services to store and listen to music is another growing cloud trend.

Market Highlights

• Online video, also known as web TV, already makes up the largest component of global Internet traffic.
• The next phase of growth for online video involves consumers accessing Over-the-Top (OTT) via other devices such as Smart TVs, connected TVs and online game consoles.
• Google retains global online video dominance with over 40% of videos viewed via YouTube worldwide.
• Internet video viewing is beginning to mimic traditional TV with Blinkx and Burst Media partnering to offer specific Internet “channels” or websites offering videos (and advertising) aimed at target audiences.
• As online entertainment and media operate in a virtual environment, this sector is seen as a prime area for benefiting from cloud computing developments.
• Seven Latin American countries are among the world’s top thirty in terms of Facebook users.
• Twitter usage increases twenty-fold in South Africa in 2011.
• The internet plays a significant part in the lives of vast numbers of people across the Asia-Pacific. The young and tech-savvy of the region spend vast amounts of time online in their pursuit of digital media entertainment.
• In Australia the mobile wagering market is experiencing nearly 400% growth.
• New Zealand will see 2.1 million consumers spend around NZ$2.4 billion online in 2012.

This report is essential reading for those needing high level strategic information and insights on global the online entertainment sector.