We wrote when the US writer’s strike started in November that it was a chance for millions online to bloom. We were right. According to new figures from Nielsen Online some online video sites have doubled their audience since the strike began.

According to Nielsen’s figures, YouTube’s audience was up 18% in the two months after the strike started and Crackle doubled its audience from 1.2 million users to 2.4 million users

A BBC report quoted Nielsen analyst Alex Burmaster “that is greater growth than you would normally see in such a short period and the strike could be a possible factor.”

A new report from the Pew Internet & American Life Project also confirmed a longer trend to online video, finding that:

• 48% of internet users said they had visited a video-sharing site such as
  YouTube. A year ago, in December 2006, 33% of internet users said they had
  visited such sites. That represents growth of more than 45% year-to-year.
• 15% of respondents said they had used a video-sharing site “yesterday” – the day
  before they were contacted for our survey. A year ago, 8% had visited such a site
  “yesterday.” Thus, on an average day, the number of users of video sites nearly
  doubled from the end of 2006 to the end of 2007.