WE ARE the army of the night, but not necessarily the same night. We want
everything and we want it … when convenient. We are nine million strong, and
growing.

The commercial TV networks hate us because they say we “steal” their programs
without doing our consumerist duty of watching the ads. But they don’t mind
boasting about us when it suits them to say a show that looks like a flop is actually a
hit.

We are the timeshifters. And some of us, maybe most of us, are also cultural
hoarders.

The ratings measurement agency OzTAM estimates that 44 per cent of Australian
households now have the ability to record programs for later viewing (fast-
forwarding through the commercials). OzTAM has added technology to the people-
meter boxes attached to TV sets in a sample of 3,100 capital city homes so that it can
now measure what people record and watch within seven days of the original
broadcast.

That gives us a new insight into the way Australians manipulate their favourite
medium. A nation of multitaskers, in the habit of getting everything it wants, has
comfortably added timeshifting to its array of skills.

When The Voice started on Channel Nine a couple of weeks ago, observers thought it
had wiped Australia’s favourite drama, Revenge, off the ratings map. The mainland
capitals audience for Revenge dropped from nearly 2 million to just over 1 million.

But when OzTAM’s timeshifting figures appeared a week later, we realised
the Revenge fans were not fickle at all – they had simply postponed their pleasure in
order to be among the early adopters of The Voice. On that night, 294,000 people in
the mainland capitals set their recorders to capture Revenge, while they were
watching The Voice.

It joined an elite group of record breakers that included an episode of Homeland in
February (309,000 timshifters), an episode of Angry Boys in May last year
(280,000) and an episode of Underbelly Razor in February (280,000).

In a normal week, our bonus viewing looks more like this …

The most recorded regular shows: 1 Private Practice(audience boosted 65 per
cent by timeshifts); 2 The Amazing Race (audience boosted 54 per cent);
3 Alcatraz (boosted 49 per cent); 4 The Good Wife (up 34 per cent); 5 Desperate
Housewives (up 33 per cent).

Those titles might lead you to suspect that most timeshifters are women, and you’d
be right. Of the 294,000 people who set their recorders to capture
Revenge against The Voice, 230,000 were women. Could this be because Dad insists
on controlling the remote on the night? Mum programs the recorder, but she learned
long ago it’s good to let Dad think he’s in charge of something.

But there’s a group beyond the timeshifters that OzTAM does not measure – people
who record shows and watch them more than seven days later. They are engaged in
what we might call cultural hoarding.
OPINION” DAVID DALE – SMH – May 6, 2012