MUMBAI: Is the idiot box scoring over the fare on broadband in terms of the number of hours being spent with it even today? Previous research had clearly revealed that television continues to rule. However, new research emerging in the UK indicates that TV's stranglehold is loosening. Users with high-speed broadband connections are switching off the TV in favour of using the internet for more than two hours a week.

A study condcuted by leading UK internet service provider Wanadoo Broadband, has revealed that consumers are spending more time on computers and less time watching TV, as broadband internet use erodes TV consumption in homes across the UK.

Called the Fishbowl 2 survey, it revealed that broadband users are online for almost twice as long (45 per cent) as narrowband users and that TV viewing is down by 12 per cent on the same period in 2002.

The study covered 1,000 people who were asked to record
their media consumption and preferences in a diary for two
weeks. Broadband emerged as the fastest growing medium in the home while TV, the fastest declining.

The survey shows that functional use of the internet is declining, with broadband users citing entertainment as their main reason for going online after 6pm. Broadband users also said the internet is the only medium to satisfy all their media needs -- including entertainment, news, music and gossip -- at once.

Wanadoo ad sales director Dave McCall pointed out that the findings only confirmed what the Internet industry has known for sometime.

"Broadband internet is slowly but surely eating into TV consumption," McCall was quoted as saying in a news report in the UK "Advertisers need to take notice of this now, because not only is broadband the fastest growing medium in the home, it is the only medium that has 100 per cent advertising presence, 100 per cent of the time."