"The State of the Console"...staggering

Nielsen's first study of the console industry is going to turn some heads. Lost Remote says, "the report clearly shows that much of the usage is taking place when people would normally be watching conventional TV programming."

Media Post says, "the study suggests that while Madison Avenue has become transfixed by other digital media, especially online, DVRs, and personal media devices such as the iPod, video games already are having a profound impact on the way people spend time watching TV for a very simple reason: Most video game consoles are connected to the primary or secondary TV set in TV households, and they are used primarily during traditionally peak TV usage time periods - especially among some of the most important and elusive TV audience demographics."

Key Takeaways:

• The console household universe has grown 18.5% sine fourth quarter 2004, compared to a 1.6% growth in the total universe of television households.
• Two-thirds of all Men aged 18-34 have access to a video game console in their home.
• The universe of connected console households (households subscribing to a service to connect their console to the internet) has grown to more then 4.4 million households, even before the newest Playstation 3 and Wii consoles are considered.
• In the NTI (Nielsen Television Index) fourth quarter of 2006, 93.8 million US Persons aged two and older used a video game console for at least one minute.
• In any given minute, approximately 1.6 million US Persons ages two and older are using a video game console.
• The heaviest console users accounted for 74.4% of all console usage and averages 345 minutes (5 hours and 45 minutes) of usage per day during the fourth quarter.

In-game advertising is going to really take off as more people get internet connectivity for their consoles. It also makes Microsoft's purchase of Massive seem pretty smart.