Social Media More Popular Than E-mail
Posted by meggebrecht CIOZone Aug 02, 2010
Just in case you needed further evidence that the U.S. is increasingly a
nation of social networkers, Nielsen issued a study Monday showing social
media usage soaring -- and continuing to replace e-mail and instant
messaging.
Americans spent 22.7 percent of their online hours in June using social
media sites, says Nielsen. That's a 43 percent increase from June 2009, when
15.8 percent of Web time was devoted to social media. Meanwhile, e-mail
usage fell from 11.5 percent to 8.3 percent, and instant messaging dropped
from 4.7 percent to 4 percent.
Still, "the rise of social networking hasn't pushed email and instant
messaging into obscurity just yet," according to a blog on the Nielson site
<http://blog.nielsen.com/nielsenwire/online_mobile/what-americans-do-online-
social-media-and-games-dominate-activity/> . "Although both saw double-digit
declines in share of time, email remains as the third heaviest activity
online ... while instant messaging is fifth."
The second-most common activity was online gaming, which rose from 9.3
percent to 10.2 percent. The time spent at Web portals fell from 5.5 percent
last June to 4.4 percent, while video watching rose from 3. 5 percent to 3.9
percent -- still very modest. Nielsen arrived at the numbers by studying the
habits of 200,000 Internet users.
"Despite the almost unlimited nature of what you can do on the Web, 40
percent of U.S. online time is spent on just three activities -- social
networking, playing games and e-mailing -- leaving a whole lot of other
sectors fighting for a declining share of the online pie," said Nielsen
analyst Dave Martin.
When you look at mobile habits, noted Martin, the numbers change. Smartphone
users spend 41.6 percent of their online time sending, reading and receiving
e-mail, up from 37.4 percent last year. Social media, on the other hand,
accounted for 10.5 percent of Web hours -- a 28 percent increase from last
year, but still well off.
"Although we see similar characteristics amongst PC and mobile internet use,
the way their activity is allocated is still pretty contrasting," he said.
"While convergence will continue, the unique characteristics of computers
and mobiles, both in their features and when and where they are used mean
that mobile Internet behavior mirroring its PC counterpart is still some way
off."
Last month, a survey <http://www.ciozone.com/index.php?option=com_myblog
<http://www.ciozone.com/index.php?option=com_myblog&show=Social-Networking-a
t-Work-Still-Rising-Survey.html&Itemid=713>
&show=Social-Networking-at-Work-Still-Rising-Survey.html&Itemid=713> of
office workers by security vendor Trend Micro found that 24 percent of U.S.
employees were accessing social media sites at work.
http://www.ciozone.com/index.php?option=com_myblog
<http://www.ciozone.com/index.php?option=com_myblog&show=Social-Media-More-P
opular-Than-E-mail.html&Itemid=713>
&show=Social-Media-More-Popular-Than-E-mail.html&Itemid=713
Received on Tue Aug 3 18:17:32 2010
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