Media Research Associates Inc. has released a report saying blogs, video, and voice-over-IP phone services are the fastest-growing segment of online usage, while e-mail and shopping continue to dominate Internet users’ time.
Small segments showed the largest growth. VoIP, used by only 2.6 percent of American adult Internet users, increased in 2006 over 2005 levels by the largest margin: 197.7 percent. Blogs, which showed the second-biggest gain (163.9 percent), were visited by only 6.7 percent of adults, and although only 11.4 percent of U.S. adults watched online videos, that category grew by 123.7 percent over 2005.
MRI Vice President of Marketing and Strategic Planning Anne Marie Kelly remarked, “We should not be surprised that relatively newer activities on the Internet have lower overall usage.”
The study indicated the top online Internet activities are diverse and almost at a growth standstill. Almost 71 percent of all American adults read email, but the figure represents only a 1.6 percent growth rate year-over-year. The number of adults reading news and current events online actually declined in 2006 by 4.6 percent. Still, 40.2 percent of American adults do it. The number of people shopping online stood at 34.2 percent—a modest 5.7 percent increase over last year, yet a sizeable 57.7 percent year-over-year growth since 2002.
Finance categories such as paying bills online and tracking and trading stocks account for 30.7 percent and 13.2 percent of U.S. adult Internet activities, respectively.
The data was part of an extensive survey conducted by Mediamark in September and October. In-person interviews were conducted in homes of about 26,000 respondents.
