An article today in the New York Times (registration required, but don’t forget BugMeNot) says that a study by Mediamark Research shows that households that have DVRs watch less TV than those without. The study was the result of 26,000 interviews with people between 3/2005 and 5/2006. ‘Course, this flies in the face of a study from last year that stated DVR owners watched more TV.
Here’s what I would say: I know when I am interviewed about viewing habits, or Internet surfing habits, I tend to understate. Some of that is because I’m a bit embarassed about my habits, but some of it is unintentional. I think this is probably true here as well.
I know several people who own DVRs and while we watch less live TV and less ads than before, I have somewhere around 25 Season Passes (this despite only have DirecTivo for about 2 months). I, and the people I know who have DVRs, all watch at least the same amount of TV or … in my case, more.
Technically, you could say that realistically, there’s less surfing involved, so you’re cutting down all that extra non-real-viewing time … but in reality, I watch more of the TV I really want, and less of the junk I don’t.
Tags: Tivo, DVR, PVR, TV, Television
