In the future, historians will look back at 2008 and see more than just an election year. They will see it as the tipping point, that moment when people went to their computers more and more for the type of video content that previously they could have only seen on TV.

The recent election themed skits on Saturday Night Live (SNL) are the perfect example of this. As reported by David Bauder of the Associated Press, “Only one third of the people who have seen at least one of the skits watched it first on SNL…more people have checked them out online or, to a lesser extent, watched later on a digital video recorder or through video on demand.” NBC estimates that in the week following the first of comedian Tina Fey’s return to SNL as the Republican Vice Presidential candidate, over 13 million streams were tracked by NBC and there is no telling how many viewers saw these skits via other online video formats.

Content providers are finally getting the picture and letting content roam free where it can build a buzz, grab the attention of more viewers and attract more advertisers. In this perfect storm of current events meets intense audience interest meets the latest technology, a whole new content propagation model is being formed, tested and perfected.

“NBC perfected its ‘widget’ technology only a few months ago, allowing video of its material to be captured across the Internet while retaining a tie to the network’s website.” Now, previously guarded content can essentially sprout its metaphorical wings, fly off in a million directions across the Web and still retain verifiable and valuable contact with the mother ship.

“I don’t know if we would have seen this sort of viral activity a year ago, if people didn’t think of their computer as a place to turn to for video entertainment,” says Amanda Welsh, head of research for Integrated Media Measurement Inc. (IMMI). IMMI has spent the last year monitoring three-screen viewing—TV, Internet and Mobile.

NBC places the SNL clips online moments after they air “Live in New York.” This means a viewer in California can now see the skits before the show airs on the West Coast. While the SNL election skits have hauled in more eyeballs than anyone at NBC or SNL could have imagined, it is clear that this viral cross-pollination of content across platforms is where future viewing—online and offline—is heading. The word amongst creators and providers is spreading as fast as an SNL viral video. Welsh points out, “The more platforms you make available to consumers, the more consumers you capture.”

The election will soon be over and the SNL skits will definitely be regarded as media milestones of a new media age, but the era of instantly-viral content delivery is now firing on all pistons as more and more people go first to the Web to download or stream their favorite TV shows, funny videos, news, movies and music offerings.

“Over the next few years, the growing popularity of viewing TV shows online is going to have a huge impact on the way brands and advertisers communicate with viewers,” says Shari Morwood, Executive Vice President of Technology, Telecommunications and Media at TNS, a marketing information and trend watching company whose remarks on this subject were quoted on a blog at NewTeeVee.com. “If advertisers can effectively leverage the online video platform, we should see much more interactivity and emotional connection between brands and the online TV viewing audience.”

As people’s attention spans grows ever shorter and the time they have to devote to watching anything gets even tighter, smart content creators, providers and advertisers will continue to gravitate to the Web and away from the more outdated models of delivery.

These days, people want the content they desire when they want it. They want to access content on their schedules, Consumers are now more at ease than ever in the media world and are now in the driver’s seat. The winners will be those who are quick to embrace this fast evolving new media model and who are not afraid to break the constricting shackles of antiquated ideas when it comes to content creation and proliferation.