BBC iPlayer Keeps Growing

The BBC's download and streaming service, iPlayer, keeps growing in popularity, notching up with 21 million program requests in April alone.

The BBC’s program download and streaming service, iPlayer, continues to grow in popularity. Introduced in December, the program requests keep piling up, with 21 million in April, a rise of 20% over March, with an average of 1.4 million weekly users.

Ashley Highfield, director of future media and technology at the BBC, released the figures at Google’s Zeitgeist 2008 forum.
It was perhaps no surprise that the two most popular shows were The Apprentice and Dr. Who. However, more than a quarter of requests were for shows that stood outside the top 20, giving a very strong overall showing.

Demand continues to increase. On May 18, some 390,000 users requested more than 900,000 programs.