News Broadcasting
Podcasting growing in the US: Nielsen survey
MUMBAI: Nielsen//NetRatings, which works in the field of Internet media and market research has announced that 6.6 per cent of America’s adult online population, or 9.2 million Web users, have recently downloaded an audio podcast
Four per cent, or 5.6 million Web users, have recently downloaded a video podcast. These figures put the podcasting population on a par with those who publish blogs, 4.8 per cent, and online daters, 3.9 per cent. However, podcasting is not yet nearly as popular as viewing and paying bills online, 51.6 per cent, or online job hunting, 24.6 per cent.
For the uninitiated podcasting is a relatively new technology that enables users to quickly and easily download multimedia files, including audio and video, for playback on mobile devices including iPods and other MP3 players, as well as cell phones.
Nielsen//NetRatings analyst Michael Lanz says, “The portability of podcasts makes them especially appealing to young on-the-go audiences. We can expect to see podcasting become increasingly popular as portable content media players proliferate”.
As is often typical with new technologies, young people are more likely than their older counterparts to engage in audio or video podcasting. Web users between the ages 18 and 24 are nearly twice as likely as the average Web user to download audio podcasts, followed by users in the 25-34 and 35-44 age groups, who were also more likely than the average Web user to do audio podcasting.
Video podcasters showed 25-34 year olds indexing the highest. Web users above the age of 45 were less likely than average to engage in podcasting of either sort. Since the popularity of Apple’s iPod is largely responsible for the spread of podcasting, not surprisingly podcasters enjoy using Apple products and visiting Apple Web sites. For example, audio and video podcasters are over three times as likely as the average Web user to use Apple’s Safari as their primary Internet browser.
Among audio podcasters, Macworld is the most-visited content site, with a composition index of 606 (see Table 4). Apple and iTunes are the No. 2 and 3 e-commerce sites visited by audio podcasters, with composition indexes of 455 and 396, respectively. The Apple connection is not as clear for video podcasters, who flock to Startrek.com among content sites, with an index of 864. Live365.com and eMusic are the two most popular e-commerce sites for video podcasters, with indexes of 730 and 656, respectively.
Lanz adds, “Competitors to the iPod are now in the marketplace, but Apple got a big head start. It will take time before other portable media players make significant in-roads with the early-adopters who are currently podcasting”.
News Broadcasting
News TV viewership jumps 33 per cent as West Asia war draws audiences
BARC Week 8 data shows news share rising to 8 per cent despite T20 World Cup
NEW DELHI:Â Even as individual television news channel ratings remain under a temporary pause, the genre itself is seeing a clear surge in audience attention.
According to the latest data from Broadcast Audience Research Council India, television news recorded a 33 per cent jump in genre share in Week 8 of 2026, covering February 28 to March 6.
The news genre accounted for 8 per cent of total television viewership during the week, up from 6 per cent the previous week. The spike in attention coincided with escalating geopolitical tensions involving the United States, Israel and Iran, which have kept global headlines firmly fixed on West Asia.
The rise is notable because it came at a time when cricket was dominating television screens. The high-stakes stages of the ICC Men’s T20 World Cup, including the Super 8 fixtures and semi-finals, were being broadcast during the same period.
Despite the cricket frenzy, viewers appeared to be toggling between sport and global affairs, boosting the overall share of news programming.
The surge in genre share comes even as the government has enforced a one-month pause on publishing ratings for individual news channels. The move followed regulatory scrutiny of the television ratings ecosystem.
While channel-level rankings remain temporarily out of sight, the genre-level data suggests that when global tensions escalate, audiences continue to turn to television news for real-time updates.
