Eclectic shlock

Americans on average will consume two hours more electric, eclectic and elective media per day in 2008 than they did a decade earlier. But will it be effective?

Veronis, Suhler and Stevenson, the New York media investment bank, predicts in its annual industry review that Americans will consume more than 11 hours of media per day in 2008 vs. 9 hours in 1998. That’s an increase of 22%.

If VSS is correct, we are destined to spend an average of six hours a day watching television in 2008, or 27% more time than squandered tubeside in 1998. As illustrated at right, this includes the viewing of broadcast, cable and DVDs.

Radio will suck up the next biggest chunk of time at a bit more than three hours a day, a gain of 23% in the 10-year period.

On a percentage basis, Internet use will have grown the most, climbing 505% to two-thirds of an hour per day. Other major gainers are games and home video, whose consumption is expected to double.

The use of recorded music, magazines, books and newspapers is expected to decline by stiff, double-digit percentages.

So, we are confronting not merely the vice of media gluttony but a decidedly unheathy diet of empty info-calories, too.