Tablets are Changing Content Consumption

“The rapid adoption of media tablets is substantively changing how consumers access, create and share content,” says Carolina Milanesi, Gartner research vice president. But some might argue that “content creation” is fairly limited to email messages, social network replies or other short messages.

A new survey by Gartner of users in the United States, United Kingdom and Australia found that the main activities moving from PCs to media tablets are checking email (81 percent of respondents), reading the news (69 percent), checking the weather forecast (63 percent), social networking (62 percent) and gaming (60 percent).

That probably illustrates as well as any statistic the key role tablets are assuming as primary content consumption devices, with the PC being used for “work” tasks related to creating more-complex content.

Media tablets also play a more dominant role in the home than mobile phones or PCs, with the highest usage taking place in the living room (87 percent), the bedroom (65 percent) and the kitchen (47 percent).

Respondents say they purchase a media tablet, in preference to a PC, for its convenience, small size and light weight.

The survey also found that 45 percent of respondents do not share their tablet at all. In other words, a tablet is almost as personal as a mobile phone in terms of usage and consumer attitude, for nearly half of users.

The respondents, early adopters of media tablets, said they use their multiple devices (PCs, TVs, mobile phones) interchangeably, rather than substituting one device for another. They use whichever device is at hand, or the most convenient to use at a particular time and for a specific task.

However, respondents use their PCs (desk-based or mobile) 20 percent less at weekends.

Overall, you might note that most consumer electronics devices these days are “consumption” devices (MP3 players, game players, tablets, smart phones, TVs) while a few devices (PCs, cameras) are mostly for content creation.