14 DAY TRIAL // Windows Media Center is used on average by over 13 million unique users per month, Microsoft revealed at the 2009 National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) Show. The Redmond company pointed out that the number of Windows users turning to Windows Media Center for “consuming” their digital content had steadily grown, but failed to provide any statistics to offer a perspective of just how the feature had been grabbing more and more eyeballs. According to the software giant, it is precisely the new content made available for Windows Media Center that has managed to increase the audience.
NBC Olympics on the Go service, the MSNBC News portal and the Sports Channel, all available via Windows Media Center have apparently contributed to driving its success. “Studies continue to show the demand for TV on the PC remains strong: A 2008 survey sponsored by Microsoft and conducted by Nielsen along with CBS Vision reported that 73 percent of respondents were interested in watching TV on their computer. Windows Media Center is delivering an optimal platform to reach the significant number of Windows Vista users in the market today, with enhancements coming in Windows 7 that make it even easier for consumers to find and access the TV shows, videos and movies they want — all in one place,” Microsoft explained.
Windows Media Center is a default component of Windows Vista Home Premium and Ultimate SKUs, and will ship with the Home Premium, Business and Ultimate editions of Windows 7. But Windows Media Center did not grab all the attention at the NAB Show. In fact, Microsoft revealed that its IPTV platform, Mediaroom, was close to breaking the 3 million subscriber mark. The Redmond giant is in this regard the developer of the world’s most deployed Internet Protocol television (IPTV) platform.
“Worldwide momentum for connected TV services powered by Microsoft Mediaroom continues to build with the number of Mediaroom subscribers expected to hit 3 million next month. In the past 12 months, the number of subscribers has more than doubled, lifting Mediaroom to the No. 1 spot in the global IPTV middleware market, according to new figures from Screen Digest,” the Redmond company revealed.