Home Enterstayment

This morning Verizon Communications Inc. (VZ) introduced a new term to the populous with Home Enterstayment – a term to describe families that are choosing to watch movies and shows at home ─ rather than an expensive night out. In fact, the term is so groundbreaking it hadn’t even made it into Wikipedia as of 4 p.m. EST on Nov. 3.

Lately, the media seems to be in portmanteau [to blend two (or more) words] overdrive as this word follows quickly on the heels of another annoying (and over used) portmanteau ─ “staycation” ─ not to mention those associated with celebrity couples or politics.

In the case of Verizon, it is using this term to promote new offers related to its FiOS TV service, primarily offering 90 days of free premium movie channels for signing up as a new customer by the end of the year, as well as discounts on its Home Media DVR product.

I’m not sure this term will find widespread adoption, especially since I could not find any other references to it on the Web. But my advice to Verizon would be to follow the K.I.S.S. principle and issue a press release that simply promotes its offers. Although the term did get my attention, it was for the wrong reasons, provoking a “you’ve got to be kidding” reaction.

Is it possible that since these families have chosen a “staycation” they might just have a little extra money to actually leave their house for entertainment? After all, the new Bond movie will only be shown in theatres. So if you want to save some money, go to a matinee and support your local theaters (and the economy) and not just Verizon.

Teresa Mastrangelo is principal analyst at [broadbandtrends, a service of The Windsor Oaks Group LLC, which is an independent market research and consulting firm specializing in the coverage of network transformation activity related to broadband infrastructure and services, including IPTV, VoIP and NGN.

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