Last year was the year of the one-minute hike in the couch potato syndrome as TV fans around the globe spent more time than ever glued to the box, statistics this week from a French media ratings agency said.
And sports, particularly soccer, remained the firm TV favorite, followed by fiction, data from over 80 territories worldwide showed.
The “One Television Year I the World” report was released ahead of the opening on Monday of the influential five-day MIPTV market in the Riviera town of Cannes.
ONE MINUTE MORE
TV addicts spent 188 minutes daily — three hours and eight minutes — on average last year, one minute more a day than in 2007, the study said.
North America notched up a big increase, with fans watching four more minutes of TV a day, taking their total average dose to four hours and 32 minutes — 272 minutes.
This compared withe a two minute increase in Europe to three hours and 37 minutes — 217 minutes — despite a three minute decrease in France and a one minute-drop in Germany.
TV fans in Latin America watched one minute more, taking daily TV intake to 182 minutes on average.
Viewing in the Asia-Pacific region rose by and average of two minutes a day to 158 minutes.
But the biggest increase was in the Middle East, where viewers watched 29 minutes more per day to reach 262 minutes.
“TV consumption is quickly changing, as new ways of watching television emerge within an expanding offer of channels,” said Jacques Braun, vice president of Eurodata TV worldwide.
SPORTS
Unsurprisingly, in a year that saw both the Beijing Olympics and soccer’s Euro 2008 take place, sport retained its top TV ranking.
Fiction was the second most popular TV genre, followed by entertainment.
US-made fiction continued to woo viewers with show-stoppers such as C.S.I. Crime Scene Investigation and C.S.I. Miami.
And long-running, massively popular TV reality shows such as Big Brother and Survivor continued to score around the world, as did family entertainment
Two Russian series, Tatyana’s Day and The Apostle, remained popular in neighboring countries, as did Colombian smash hit telenovela series Ugly Betty.
The most unlikely success of last year, however, was the Turkish TV series Gumus, which has attracted a big following in the Middle East, despite the show’s failing to catch on in its native country.
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