According to a recent survey by the Conference Board and TNS Global, online viewership of television broadcasts has almost doubled since 2006 to nearly 20% of Internet families, of which on average  72% watch programs online on a daily basis.

The top five categories of programs watched were: News, drama, sitcoms/comedy, reality shows and sports.

The most popular destinations for TV on the PC are the channel/network’s homepage,  YouTube, iTunes and Hulu

Today Amazon.com announced that its video on demand streaming service.

Amazon is offering customer the abilty to watch advertising free movies and television shows instantly within a web browser or streamed directly on to Sony televisions equipped with an internet video link.

“The ability to watch content instantly without downloading first was among the most requested features of our customers, and now it’s live,” said Roy Price, director of the service.

Since Unbox was launched, a plethora of devices, technologies and services have appeared to challenge US cable and satellite providers in providing programming on demand to the living-room television.

Amazon’s service can also be displayed through a Tivo digital video recorder and a Microsoft Xbox 360 games console linked to a TV.