Why "Interactive TV" is Dead

Tablets are displacing PCs and smart phones as the “couch computer” of choice, according to Forrester Research. But even before tablets began to assume that role, it already was clear that "interactivity" with TV was an experience using the Internet. 


One might argue that answers the question about prospects for "interactive TV." Simply, users have voted for "interaction" with TV content using the Internet, mobile devices, Web and apps. There are therefore vastly limited opportunities to build "interaction" into TV content that do not lean on mobile devices, tablets and PCs as the vehicles for interaction. 


Some 85 percent of US tablet owners use their tablets while watching TV, and according to Nielsen, 30 percent of total tablet time is spent while watching TV. 


 Tablets also turn TV into a “dumb” device, Forrester argues.


About 18 percent of respondents surveyed by Forrester say they connect their tablets to their TVs. So much for "smart TVs."


Some 32 percent of tablet owners say they won’t buy a small (less than 24”) TV in the future, apparently because the tablet itself now displaces the small TV.


Consumers are using tablets as personal TVs where they had none before, such as in the kitchen, bathroom, and airports, for example.


The larger point is that "interactive TV" already has become a mass market activity, just not in the way its proponents originally had expected.