TDG: User-Generated Video Captures Eyeballs, Not Dollars

A new report predicted that user-generated video will continue to account for close to one-half of video streams over the next five years but will not translate that popularity into ad dollars.

According to a report by research firm TDG, Online TV and the Future of Digital Video Advertising, user-generated video will only account for about 4% of video-related ad revenue over the same period. That leaves traditional video, streamed TV shows and movies and made-for-net content with the disproportionate amount of revenue.

How much will that be? TDG predicted that online-video ad revenue will increase almost twentyfold, from an estimated $590 million in 2008 to an estimated S9.94 billion by 2013.

The report warned pay TV operators that online delivery of video directly to TVs is the wave of the future, with programmers bypassing the pay TV operator "gatekeepers" via online distribution, "ironically, by the pay TV operator.”

John Eggerton

Contributing editor John Eggerton has been an editor and/or writer on media regulation, legislation and policy for over four decades, including covering the FCC, FTC, Congress, the major media trade associations, and the federal courts. In addition to Multichannel News and Broadcasting + Cable, his work has appeared in Radio World, TV Technology, TV Fax, This Week in Consumer Electronics, Variety and the Encyclopedia Britannica.