Reports

AI has already hit entertainment at the industry level – and the impacts on audience culture will not be far behind. A variety of AI tools are now readily available on ‘fremium’ tiers at a consumer level. Companies may be looking towards what the new world of web 3.

This keynote took place at the beginning of the MIDiA webinar:The great monetisation reset |New ways to monetise streaming video audiences. The full presentation, panel, and Q&A session, can be found on LinkedIn and YouTube ....

For two decades now, Steam has been one of the go-to digital game distributors, particularly for computer gamers and developers. Yet, its weekly active audience does not quite reflect a fully representative sample of computer gamers. Rather, Steam’s weekly active users (WAUs) are a specific niche of gamers, characterised by their demographics, genre preferences and wider gamer behaviours.

In the US, 25-34-year-olds are the music industry’s most valuable segment. Yet their relationship with streaming is tenuous. Streaming is not meeting these consumers’ need for a more social, less algorithm-driven experience. What is more, they appear most likely to give their subscriptions up.

This slide deck presents a snapshot of different social platform users, including age breakdowns, activity on social platforms, and cross-platform usage. It covers Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, WhatsApp, Pinterest, Instagram, Snapchat, Discord, and TikTok.

The economic recession, and related layoffs at major podcasting divisions, have some questioning the future of the format. However, podcasts are following a similar trajectory as music did in its transition to streaming and have reached critical mass — 26% consumer penetration — faster than music streaming subscriptions did.

The pandemic-induced boom in content creation has saturated social video platforms at a time when creators are battling a downturn in digital advertising revenues. These dual pressures of less exposure and dwindling financial returns have put pressure on mid-tier creators; the community that derives all their creator income from advertising, subscriptions, and donations, but have subscale audience to superstar creators.

This report presents a snapshot of ad-supported video users, including age breakdowns, time spent on video (subscription video on demand (SVOD), ad-supported video on demand (AVOD), and pay-per-view), responsiveness to ads, devices used, and TV genre preferences.

2023 has been jump-started by rapid progression in the adoption of artificial intelligence (AI). From the launch of ChatGPT to AI-powered DJs, this technology is revolutionising common practices, impacting consumers, creators, and industry leaders alike.

With gamers being mainstream, video streaming services and their content offerings can benefit by increasing focus on the preferences of gamers. Crucially, this enables subscription video on demand (SVOD) services to drive engagement, broaden reach and improve retention.

Following a spectacular year of growth in 2021, global recorded music revenue growth slowed significantly in 2022, due to the combined impact of global economic headwinds and growth slowdown in mature streaming markets. Context, though, is everything – not many industries can deliver solid growth while the global economy is in turmoil, ad markets are falling, and many emerging tech sectors are in crisis.

Audiences are consuming in different ways, on different platforms, and at different times – from lean-back passive viewing, to lean-forward on-demand, lean-in social engagement, and lean-through creation. Web 3.0, largely driven by AI, will not change this.

This report presents a Q4 2022 snapshot of gamers’ reception to various types of digital advertisements. It covers: Display / banner advertisements Video advertisements Video advertisements in mobile games Audio advertisements Advertisements that are relevant to the consumer Advertisements in services that consumers already pay for Gamer segments included are: By gamer platform (Mobile, PC, Console) By games genre fans (FPS, RPG, Action / Adventure, Platformer, Open world, Sandbox, Puzzle, Simulator, Strategy, MOBA, Survival, and sports games) By games service subscriber (Apple Arcade, EA Play / Pro, NintendoSwitch Online, Xbox Game Pass, Xbox Live, PlayStation Now, PlayStation Plus,Ubisoft+) The data in this report is from MIDiA Research’s Q4 2022 consumer survey.

Radio set the stage for music streaming and podcasts, only to watch them take portions of its audience. However, there is a clear opportunity for radio companies to assert themselves in the podcast market, drawing on decades of programming expertise to retain audiences and find new ones.

Social media has steadily integrated music, and music creation tools have steadily become more social. These trends are converging, accelerated by shifts in consumer behaviour and artificial intelligence (AI). The result could be a new set of music creation and re-creation tools, integrated within social platforms and geared towards casual consumers.

The slowing of subscription growth in developed markets means that streaming services have to look both towards post-subscription and post-advertising models. A focus on retention will maintain downward pressure on subscription price elasticity, compounded by the need to ration advertising loads to minimise churn.

This report deep dives into the themes identified in MIDiA’s 2023 predictions report. These themes will drive innovation in the digital entertainment landscape in 2023 across music, video, games, audio, cultural trends, and the creator economy. Expect 2023 to be a of period significant disruption and innovation forced upon the digital entertainment industry, as nearly two decades of uninterrupted growth makes way for consumer-led disruption that is driven by a reduction in discretionary spending, attention, and willingness to make do with tired old formats.

Though parts of the games industry still stigmatise in-game purchases, the business model is a fundamental part of a successful and sustainable growth formula for games companies. The current macroeconomic climate will only catalyse their importance. Diving into the nuances of in-game spenders’ behaviours and attitudes unlockssignificant growth and conversion optimisation opportunities for games companiesthat are already in pursuit of this business model.

Group watching television with family and friends is being consigned to a bygone era. Algorithms are forcing entertainment consumers into silos through an endless stream of personally recommended content and the fallout is a relentless battle for audience engagement across a myriad of devices.

Games, sports, music, video, audio, and social content all compete not only for consumers’ attention (and money), but also their fandom. However, the oversaturation of content is devaluing entertainment itself, by overly commodifying it. Entertainment businesses and content providers will need to rethink how to generate better value for audiences, especially if they want to make true fans of those audiences – especially in an environment of recession (both in the global economy and consumer attention).