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21 September 2004
IM Usage in the US
The recent publication of two reports offers the opportunity to make a synthesis and an assessment of our understanding of IM usage. Hopefully, this review will be enriched and broadened to include more research from other horizons.
The first report How Americans use instant messaging by the Pew Internet & American Life Project also includes data from comScore Media Metrix. The second report, America Online Inc.'s Second Annual Instant Messaging Trends Survey shows IM has gone mainstream, is well summarized in an AOL Press Release.
The Pew/Internet report situates adoption rate at 42% of the adult Internet population. Possibly because its sample is younger - it starts at age 13 - and exclusively urban, the AOL report finds a much higher adoption rate at 76%. These numbers are relatively stable compared with previous surveys. What has changed, though, is IM adoption in the workplace. Pew/Internet evaluates IM users at work to be approximately 11 Million, that is 21% of IM users, data confirmed by AOL that finds IM users at work to be 27% of all IM users. Compared with the same survey last year, this represents a 71% increase in adoption. IM usage at work will be the subject of a paper to come.
The Demographics of Instant Messaging
The adoption rate is not homogeneous across age groups. Both the Pew and AOL surveys show that the number of IM users decreases with age. In the Pew report, 62% of Gen Y (age 18-27) who use the Internet are also IM users; 37% of Gen X (28-39); 33% of Trailing Boomers (age 40-49); 29% Leading Boomers (age 50-58); 25% matures (59-68) and 29% after work (age over 69). In the AOL report, about 90% of teens and young adults say they instant message; 71% of the 22-34 age group ; 55% of the 35-54 age group ; and 48% of the over 55 age group. The younger group also favors IM over e-mail (49% of the 13-21 age group vs 6% among over 55) a result confirmed by comScore Media Metrix that found Gen Y (age 18-27) using IM more than e-mail (46%) vs 18% among Gen X (age 28-39) IM users. The 13-21 age group is also as likely to use their IM screen names (52%) as their e-mail addresses (53%) as calling cards.
Furthermore, the Pew report found that Gen Y are more creative and active in the way they manage the "away" messages and contact lists, adding new contacts on a weekly basis. gen Y also engages in parallel IM conversations on a daily basis. The frequency and duration of IM sessions per day varies also with age. comScore Media Metrix reports that Gen Y and Gen X are more numerous to log on several times per day and to instant message for about an hour.
In addition, the comScore Media Metrix report also gives some indications of a link between IM adoption income (lower household use IM more than Upscale household) and family structure (household with children use IM more than household without children). The Pew report also found a link between level of education (64% of IM users have less than a high school degree) and household income ( 49% have income of less that $30.000) and adoption of IM. However, the analysts suggest that these findings may be due to the large number of young people among the IM users.
The Usage of Instant Messaging
The Pew report provides useful data to situate the context of IM use. IM activity takes place largely at home (77%), at work (21%) and at school (7%). Wireless devices, such as a laptop computer or a mobile phone, are becoming tools for IM (15%), whereas the AOL report puts it a bit higher at 32%. Frequency of sessions varies between one or more daily logins (36%); a few times per week (27%) or less often (37%), whereas average session duration varies between about 15 minutes (47%), between 15 and 60 minutes (26%) and more than 60 minutes (22%).
What characterises IM Usage is that it goes in parallel with other activities and concerns small groups. IM Usage also includes the management of these relationships beyond ongoing conversations, by means of "away" messages and profiles.
The majority of IM users browse, play games, talk on the phone or watch TV while they instant message. According to comScore Media Metrix, 32% of IM users always do something else on their computer, whereas 29% do so some of the time; 20% always do something else off their computer, whereas 30% do so some of the time.
The majority of IM users exchange with between one and five people (66% of IM users vs 9% interacting with more than 10 people). The groups are relatively stable, removal or addition of people from buddy lists being rare.
Activities carried out using IM are fundamentally social. They include keeping in touch, coordinating evenings and week-ends, playing games, dating and sharing of information. On this latter activity, Pew/comScore Media Metrix found that 31% IM users share links to web sites or articles; 30% share photos or documents; 14% share streamed web content or video and 5% music or video files.
IM's support for these social activities is not limited to the semi-synchronous conversations. The "away" message and "profile" features provide supports to extend the relationships between conversations.
comScore Media Metrix found that "away" messages are posted by 47% of the IM users to entertain, to inform about something specific, about their whereabouts or about what they are doing. "Away" messages are either chosen from a list of standard messages (63%) or created ad hoc (45%). The Pew report found that 18% of IM users post "away" messages daily or almost daily. The AOL report indicates that 25% of IM users change the "away" message at least once a week, and that 31% read other people's "away" messages every time they log on or everytime a new one appears. The Pew report adds a few elements: 21% of IM users make a daily posting of quotes or thoughts of the day, and 12% post a phone number to signal where they can be reached.
Two more elements complete the IM user's identity: the profile and the screen name.
About the profile, comScore Media Metrix found that 34% of IM users have a public profile, which is either inspirational or humourous quotes (42%), contact information (33%), links to sites (18%), links to personal photos (12%) or important personal news (9%)
About the screen, the AOL report finds that 36% of IM users have more than one screen name vs the 17% found by comScore Media Metrix. The main motivation to do so (59%) is to interact with different groups, like friends, family, colleagues, separately.
Looking at this list of activities, it is not surprising then to find that the most appreciated features are: photo sharing (38%), customization (36%) and file sharing (32%).
Where: US
When: February - July 2004
Posted at 03:56 PM in Usage of IM | Permalink