18 January 2005
Young and affluent most active Internet group
Most active web users are young, affluent, a synthesis of a JupiterResearch report, identifies the most active user group with people of age between 25 and 34 and household incomes over $ 75K. They are:
- males (74% vs. 49% Internet population)
- their household has a broadband connection (55% vs. 33%)
- with five or more years of Internet experience (84% vs. 51%)
This group considers that Internet increases the efficiency of their daily lives (65% vs. 43%); and carries out a wider range of activities online that the overall Internet population, e.g. browses, accesses media, does personal business, such as online banking (62% vs. 42%).
Posted at 11:09 PM in Usage of the Web | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
10 January 2005
What you see is what you ask - more on Internet usage in the USA
Year 2000
Harris Interactive started polling online US adults on their online activities by means of a nationwide telephone survey:
Thinking about what you do online, how often do you use the Internet, the World Wide Web or an online service to......: very often, often, sometimes, rarely, never
The results of the end 2004 survey (between the 9th and 14th of November) are very much consistent with what is known.
The Internet's single most used function is sending and receiving email (66%, with 30% very often and 36% often).
Among browsing activities, the most frequently cited is to do research for work or school (46%, 18% very often, 28% often), followed by to check on news (43%, 16% very often, 27% often), to get info about a hobby or special interest (40%, 15% very often, 25% often), to gather info about products and services (38%, 14% very often, 24% often).
Two activities have grown significantly since the previous year:
- to make travel plans or reservations (+ 11%, to 26%)
- to look for information about health or diseases (+ 6%, to 21%)
All the other activities remain stable.
Does that mean that online behaviour has matured and become routine? Or is it that these surveys are missing important shifts and changes in the way the Internet is used?
It is unfortunate that the categories of online activity Harris Interactive used in 2000 have not evolved much over the years to include web publishing, participation in communities, collaborative projects and rating systems. The Internet is not like traditional top-down mass media. And its users shouldn't be reduced to consumers who access, search and find information; download games or software; go through payments and other administrative procedures. The issue is that not only Harris Interactive, but the large majority of surveys of online activities, use these same "passive" categories.
Posted at 03:39 PM in Information Society, Usage of the Web | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
08 November 2004
Communication technologies in the Arab World
Thanks to a recent post by emarketer titled The Mobile Middle East, I learnt about the Arab Advisors Group, a private market research and analysis company based in Amman, Jordan. Since 2001, the Arab Advisors Group studies the communications, media and technology markets in Algeria, Bahrain, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Oman, Palestine, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Syria, Tunisia, UAE, as a representative sample of the larger Arab World's media and telecom markets that it estimates at over 300M people in 22 countries; 41 mobile operators; 23 fixed operators; 36 datacomm operators and close to 300 ISPs.
I spent some time reading the summaries of recent reports looking for insights into how communication technologies are used in these countries.
Levels of connectivity
In terms of adoption and usage, the region appears to be far from homogeneous. The Arab Advisors Group calculates the Total Country Connectivity Measure as 1) households with fixed lines + 2) households with GSM subscriptions + 3) households with Internet users / total number of households. The Gulf countries, that is Qatar, Kuwait, Bahrain, UAE, emerge as being the most connected, whereas the Mediterranean countries, that is Tunisia, Egypt, Syria, Algeria and Morocco, are the least connected (April, 2004).
Offer and cost for ADSL conenction
The ADSL market is also very inhomogeneous. In the countries that have ADSL services - there are no ADSL services in Iraq, Lebanon, Libya and Palestine - the cost of a home ADSL connection varies from 24$/month in Egypt to 135$/month in Syria. Jawad Abbassi, head of the Arab Advisors Group comments: "That Egypt is the star in the Arab World in having the lowest ADSL cost is no surprise. The major ISP in the country are allowed to negotiate their own international bandwidth agreements and not to be tied to getting the bandwidth from the incumbent fixed operator. Moreover, these ISPs are allowed to collocate at Telecom Egypt's exchanges and use Telecom Egypt unbundled copper wires at reasonable rates". Looking at cost not in absolute, but relative terms, as a percentage of GDP per capita, the least affordable ADSL service is in Sudan, followed by Syria, Jordan, Morocco, Algeria, Egypt, and the most affordable is in Qatar. The cost of ADSL in Egypt is thus comparable in real terms to Interational rates, less dear than the other Arab countries, but still very expensive for Egyptians (September, 2004).
Internet access in Algeria
One report focuses on Algeria's ISP market and Internet adoption. After opening the ISP market in 1998, in the spring 2004, Algeria had 30 operational ISPs out of 91 authorized operators. Internet users were about 420.000 at the end of 2003, equivalent to a 1.31% penetration rate. The analyst Serene Zawaydeh writes "French is the main language used in Algerian websites. Most websites lack rich content and lack sophistication. Only few banks have online presence and there are still no Internet banking services in Algeria." (March, 2004)
Mobile communications in Saudi Arabia
Another report looks at Saudi Arabia's mobile telecom market and usages with a survey of 202 GSM-customer households (141 Saudis, and 61 non-Saudis) in Jeddah, Riyadh, Dammam, Dhahran. We learn that practically all users (95%) have Arabic language handsets, use SMS (90%), while very few access the mobile Internet (less than 1.5%). Almost one out of two Mobile phone customers (42%) buys second-hand handsets. Handsets are replaced within less than a year. Familiarity with handsets features appears to be very limited (June, 2004). Overall, user-generated SMS account for most of mobile operators' data revenues, i.e. between 4 and 8% of total revenue.
Overall Internet audience and online advertising
Looking at Online advertising spending in the region, the Arab Advisors Group finds evaluates it to be between 8 and 10 M $, and very small compared to the 250 M $ spent on Satellite TV advertising. Two factors contribute to this gap: the satellite audience is much larger than the Internet audience, and it is also very largely a male audience (81%). It occurs that Satellite TV ads mostly target the female audience, which represents only 19% of the already small Internet audience.
Where: Arab World
When: 2004
Posted at 03:46 PM in Usage of Mobile Phones, Usage of the Web | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack
26 October 2004
A snapshot of US College students Internet usage
comScore MediaMetrix The Score October 2004 reports that, in the US, more than 12 M College students (out of around 13M) use the web. They do so with a frequency and duration that are about 20% higher than the average Internet user. Their favorite destinations, as measured by the "the composition index: a measure of the proportional likelihood of a population segment to visit a site or group of sites compared to the average user", are EDUCATION - the Career & Development and Training & Education categories - TECHNOLOGY - especially the Downloads category with a strong preference for peer-to-peer applications - ENTERTAINMENT - 50% visit Humor and Music sites, such as Launch, MTV Networks, AOL Music, MusicMatch, ArtistDirect, WindowsMediaMusic - RETAIL - Computer Hardware and Consumer Electronics, especially Mobile phone sites like AT&T Wireless, Cingular, T-Mobile. College students make extensive use of IM: 40% of college students use at least one IM application; and iTunes: college students represent 17% of all the iTunes users, but only about 8% of all Internet users.
Where: US
When: September 2004
Posted at 07:56 PM in Usage by College Students, Usage of the Web | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack