MediaPost: Research Records High DVR Penetration, Commercial Skipping

Nielsen Media Research has estimated that overall usage of DVR technology is about 3.5 percent of U.S. TV households. However, new research by Ipsos-Insight claims that the figure is 5.8 percent, and a whopping 11.4 percent among satellite subscribers.

The study also ranked skipping commercials (63 percent) as DVR user's favorite feature followed by the pause feature (10 percent) and using the DVR to view instant replays (5 percent). Cable companies are just now starting to roll out set top boxes with DVR technology embedded within. Once every set top box in the country has DVR technology and 63 percent of those people use that set top box to skip ads, it'll be tough to argue that current broadcast ad models won't change significantly.