UK video sites 40% traffic increase

According to Hitwise statistics, UK traffic to video websites is up 40.7% over the past year. In February 2009 1 in 35 internet visits was to a specialist video web site, this is up from 1 in 50 in February 2008.

YouTube has 62.9% of the total visits, BBC iPlayer is second with 11.2% and Google 3rd with 2%.

BBC iPlayer traffic has grown 152% over the past year receiving traffic via search for its' favourite TV shows such as "East Enders" and Comic Relief as well as traffic from the BBC's other sites such as Radio 4.

Wikipedia is the most popular for music video searches with 10% overall share, YouTube's share during week ending 14th March 2009 was 7.5% and although this is a marginal drop on the previous week, YouTube's overall traffic is up.

It still remains to be seen whether YouTube will resolve its negotiations with the PRS and its' decision to remove copy-written music videos. The long term effects of doing this are still to be seen.