For 20 years, Mary Meeker--now of the venture capital firm Kleiner, Perkins, Caufield and Byers--has been presenting an annual overview of Internet trends that has become semi-legendary in the industry. If you'd like to listen to a speaker go through 196 Powerpoint slides in 25 minutes, the link to her presentation at the Internet Trends 2015--Code Conference on May 27, 2015 is
here. If you just want the slides they are
here. For those who like taking a drink from a fire hose of information, this presentation is for you.
Here, I'll just pass along a few slides that particularly caught my eye, on the general theme of how our interaction with media is evolving. The old model is about turning a station on or off, or going to a certain website to read what's there. The new model is toward greater interactivity. For example, here's a figuring that starts with the VCR and cable television back in the 1970s, as way in which users began to exercise more control over media, and points to the many ways in which this trend has expanded.
Of course, this change has now gone well beyond the ability to choose which movie to watch. Interactivity involves both individuals posting content, and looking at content posted by others. For example,
YouTube reports that 300 hours of video are uploaded to the site every minute, Meeker offers a graph showing that Facebook is now up to 4 billion video views per day.
Of course, this use of media isn't just about watching cat videos. It's more and more using mobile devices like smartphones or tablets for many purposes: news, directions, events, and more.
Indeed, many of the "millenials" in the 18-34 age bracket are umbilically attached to their smartphones.
The upshot of these kinds of changes is a rapid growth in the time spent each day using digital media---expecially with mobile connections. US adults are now up to more than five hours a day with digital media, double the level of seven years ago.
