Saturday 20 December 2008

2.6 billion minutes are spent on Facebook each day worldwide

"Average user has 100 friends on the site
2.6 billion minutes are spent on Facebook each day (worldwide)
More than 13 million users update their statuses at least once each day
More than 2.5 million users become fans of Pages each day
More than 700 million photos uploaded to the site each month
More than 4 million videos uploaded each month
More than 15 million pieces of content (web links, news stories, blog posts, notes, photos, etc.) shared each month
More than 2 million events created each month
More than 19 million active user groups exist on the site"
Source: Facebook Press Statistics, retreived 20th December 2008
Updated here

Tuesday 16 December 2008

Barack Obama is the most followed twitter user

Barack Obama has nearly 150,000 twitter followers (although he hasn't updated since he won the Presidential election). His most recent tweet was
"We just made history. All of this happened because you gave your time, talent and passion. All of this happened because of you. Thanks" on 5th November.

The fastest rising twitter users are:
Rick Sanchez - 35,882 followers in 141 days
Stephen Fry - 32,671 followers in 154 days
Source: Twitterholic.com - data collected on 16th December 2008

Friday 12 December 2008

In Helsinki 57% of public transport single tickets are paid by mobile

"In Helsinki, Finland 57% of public transport single tickets are paid by mobile. In Croatia over half of all parking is paid by mobile. In South Africa you can have your paycheck paid directly to the mobile phone account linked to your mobile banking account. In Soweto a barbershop has more than half of its customers paying by mobile. 20% of London’s congestion charge is paid by mobile. In Slovenia every vending machine, every McDonald’s restaurant, and every taxicab accepts payment by mobile phone. In Kenya the maximum limit of mobile-to-mobile money payments is set to 1 million U.S. dollars per single transaction. And in South Korea, all credit card companies enable their credit cards to the owners’ mobile phones by default, offering to send an optional old-fashioned plastic credit card to the customer’s home address for free."
Source: Figures quoted by Alan Moore on page 8 of his paper The Glittering Allure of the Mobile Society, November 2008

Thursday 11 December 2008

YouTube was the top search result for 2008 in 11 major countries

YouTube was the top search result in Google for 11 major countries in 2008 - Austria, Finland, France, Hong Kong (OK, not a country), Italy, Malaysia, Mexico, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, & Taiwan. This is 11, out of a total of 34 countries reported on by Google.
This shows two things - that YouTube is incredibly popular globally, and that people use search for navigational purposes - that is to find specific things that they already know (rather than type in a term like 'video site')
Source: Google Zeitgeist 2008

Wednesday 10 December 2008

In Japan, mobile accounts for over 90% of all digital music revenue

"Digital recorded music sales grew by over 20% year-on-year in all our comparator countries except France and Italy. Mobile music downloads now account for over half of all recorded digital music revenue in France, Italy and Japan. In Japan, mobile accounts for over 90% of all digital music revenue, compared to 29% for the UK."
Source: Ofcom International Communications Market 2008, November 2008
(The whole report - over 300 pages - is available for free download here

Approximately 70 new iPhone apps are added every day

"There are, as of Monday, 10,215 applications in the app store. The store is adding about 70 or so new applications every day.
Of those apps, about 3,500 of them are games (games and entertainment categories). The average price is $3.13 with $0.99 being the most common price. Interesting how this has fallen over the past few months.
It would cost almost $32,000 to buy every single app in the app store, but you would only be able to install 148 of them at a time. The least popular category is Weather with only 52 apps thus far.
A the current pace, the iTunes App Store should hit 25,000 applications sometime around the 1 year anniversary of July 11, 2009."
Source: 148apps blog, 29th November 2008, pre-empting Apple's announcement of 10,000 applications

There are now over 10,000 individual apps for the iPhone

"Apple has announced catalog and download numbers for iPhone applications in the form of a full-page ad that ran in Friday's edition of The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal.
The ad, which can be seen after the page break, boasts that more than 300 million applications have been downloaded from a catalog that now tops 10,000 different apps."
Source: Apple, in an ad in the NYT and WSJ, cited by CNET, 5th December 2008

Tuesday 9 December 2008

A SecondLife avatar has approximately the same carbon footprint as a Brazillian

"If there are on average between 10,000 and 15,000 avatars "living" in Second Life at any point, that means the world has a population of about 12,500. Supporting those 12,500 avatars requires 4,000 servers as well as the 12,500 PCs the avatars' physical alter egos are using. Conservatively, a PC consumes 120 watts and a server consumes 200 watts. Throw in another 50 watts per server for data-center air conditioning. So, on a daily basis, overall Second Life power consumption equals:

(4,000 x 250 x 24) + (12,500 x 120 x 24) = 60,000,000 watt-hours or 60,000 kilowatt-hours

Per capita, that's:

60,000 / 12,500 = 4.8 kWh

Which, annualized, gives us 1,752 kWh. So an avatar consumes 1,752 kWh per year. By comparison, the average human, on a worldwide basis, consumes 2,436 kWh per year. So there you have it: an avatar consumes a bit less energy than a real person, though they're in the same ballpark.
Now, if we limit the comparison to developed countries, where per-capita energy consumption is 7,702 kWh a year, the avatars appear considerably less energy hungry than the humans. But if we look at developing countries, where per-capita consumption is 1,015 kWh, we find that avatars burn through considerably more electricity than people do.
More narrowly still, the average citizen of Brazil consumes 1,884 kWh, which, given the fact that my avatar estimate was rough and conservative, means that your average Second Life avatar consumes about as much electricity as your average Brazilian."
Source: Nicholas Carr, 5th December 2006, on his blog Rough Type

Wednesday 3 December 2008

13-25s make up over 30% of all UK mobile internet users

"The distribution of PC Internet users was found to be relatively equal across each of the age groups studied [Under 25s, 25-34s, 35-44s, 44-55s, 55+s], with approximately one-fifth of the total audience coming from each segment. Mobile Internet usage, on the other hand, skewed substantially younger, with under-25-year-olds accounting for 30 percent of all users. Indeed, this age group represented nearly 50 percent more users than the 45-54 year old (11 percent) and the 55+ year old age groups (10 percent) combined. Mobile Internet users age 35 and under accounted for well over half (56 percent) of total users.
One point of congruency occurred in the 35-44 year old age group, which accounted for a 23 percent share of total users in both the PC and mobile user-bases."
Source: comScore UK PC & Mobile Internet Usage Report, December 2008

Monday 1 December 2008

7.3m Britons used the mobile internet in Q3 2008, up 25% on Q2

"From Q2 to Q3 2008, the number of Britons using mobile Internet increased by 25% (from 5.8 to 7.3 million) compared to 3% for PC-based Internet (34.3 to 35.3 million Britons).
The mobile Internet audience has a higher concentration of younger users than PC-based Internet; 25% of mobile Internet consumers are aged 15-24 compared to 16% for PC-based consumers. Whilst, 23% of the PC-based Internet population is 55+, only 12% of the mobile Internet audience is"
Source: Nielsen Online, 24th November 2008

91% of UK mobile owners keep the phone within 3 feet, 24x7

"- 91% of mobile owners keep the phone within 3 feet, 24x7
- Mobile is as addictive as smoking cigarettes. Removing mobile phones produces similar withdrawal pains as attempting to stop smoking.
- Text-and-driving is more dangerous than stoned or drunk driving.
63% of people are not willing to share their phone with our spouse.
- 1 in 3 partners snoop inside the phone, mostly when we're in the shower. 10% of people ended relationships after this.
- 1 in 4 British couples sleeps apart 1 night a week because of their partners addiction to Blackberry, phones, etc."
Source: Tom Hume, 17th November 2008, quoting figures reported by Tomi Ahonen at the Future of Mobile conference in London

178 million Europeans are online each week

"- 178 million Europeans are online each week
- Over half (55%) of internet users online everyday
- Time online by 25-34’s is driving digital growth in 2008
- Online research influences brand decisions for 41%
- Almost half (49%) of all broadband users are now wireless"
Source: The European Interactive Advertising Association (EIAA), 19th November 2008

Apple has sold 174.1m iPods

"To put that number into perspective, enough iPods have been sold to provide a personal 'Pod to every man, woman, and child in the United Kingdom, Australia, the Netherlands, Greece, Israel, Sweden, Austria, Chile, Denmark, Ireland, Switzerland, New Zealand, and Greenland. And you'd still have enough leftover to give one to each fan attending Super Bowl XLIII eight days after the Mac turns 25."
Source: RegisterHardware, 18th November 2008, citing Apple figures

Gears of War 2 generates 15m hours of online gameplay in a weekend

"The original Gears Of War game was a massive success for the Xbox 360 console and now the new instalment, Gears Of War 2 (GOW2), looks like it may be even bigger, racking up sales of 2m in its first weekend.
Not only does that make it one of the biggest ever openings on the console but it managed to smash the Xbox LIVE record for online activity too. More than 1.5 million people signed into Gears of War 2 during the weekend, racking up a total 15 million gameplay hours, setting a new record for concurrent LIVE players."
Source: Gizmodo, 12th November 2008

Facebook has 15m regular users via mobile phones

"People are hungry for interactive mobile features worldwide, and Facebook users are no exception. Usage of our mobile products has grown from 5 million to 15 million active users since the beginning of the year. We have expanded our mobile team and are continuing to make improvements every day."
Source: Facebook, 10th November 2008
Update - as at early January 2009 this had risen to 21m

The Apple iPhone was the best-selling phone in the US in Q3 2008

"According to The NPD Group, the leader in market research for the wireless industry, Apple’s iPhone 3G surpassed the Motorola RAZR as the leading handset purchased by adult consumers* in the U.S. in the third quarter (Q3) of 2008. RAZR had been ranked by NPD as the top-selling consumer handset for the past 12 quarters."
Source: NPD Group, 10th November 2008

The top 10 emerging markets will surpass the top 10 developed markets in terms of internet users in 2008

See chart 36 of the presentation
Source: IMF, ITU, Morgan Stanley Research, cited in Morgan Stanley Technology/Internet Trends, 5th November 2008

Number of users of Opera Mini mobile web browser has grown 311% in 12 months

"In October, Opera Mini was used by approximately 21 million users, a 10.6% month-on-month increase from September 2008 and more than 311% compared to October 2007"
Source, Opera, makers of the world's most popular mobile browser, November 2008

3bn photos have been posted to Flickr

This is the 3 billionth photo.
Source: Flickr, 3rd November 2008

The Apple iPhone outsold the Blackberry in Q3 2008

"6.9 million iPhone units were sold in the quarter, more than in all previous quarters combined. After just 15 months in the mobile phone business, Apple outsold RIM in the September quarter. 6.1 million BlackBerry handsets were sold. Measured by revenue, Apple is now the third largest mobile phone supplier, after Nokia and Samsung"
Source: Thomas Husson of Jupiter Research, 22nd October 2008, citing an Apple earnings statement

MySpace stream 40m songs in the first 7 days of MySpace Music

"MySpace’s Jamie Kantrowitz stated there had been in the US alone 40m streams in the first seven days after launch of MySpace Music, with 17-18 streams per person."
Source: Mark Mulligan of Jupiter, 10th October 2008, citing data given by MySpace at the Popkomm conference

XBox360 users buy 3.8m music tracks a month

"In a statement designed to highlight its self-appointed status as the "preferred stage" for music-based games "Guitar Hero" and "Rock Band," Microsoft released data showing gamers, on average, buy 3.8 million songs a month, for either game, and have bought more than 45 million tracks for both to date, across all installments of the respective franchises."
Source: Billboard, 20th October 2008, citing Microsoft

10bn photos have been uploaded to Facebook

"We recently hit a really cool milestone, our users have now uploaded over 10 billion photos to the site. Now, that’s a big number, but we actually store four image sizes for each uploaded photo, so that’s over 40 billion files.
To celebrate, we got a bunch of cupcakes and handed them out to our engineering and operations groups. One of our engineers calculated that if we had gotten one cupcake for each of our photos, and lined them up side by side, the line could reach halfway to the moon.
Here’s some other interesting recent stats on photos:
- 2-3 Terabytes of photos are being uploaded to the site every day
- We have just over one petabyte of photo storage
- We serve over 15 billion photo images per day
- Photo traffic now peaks at over 300,000 images served per second"
Source: Facebook, 15th October 2008

42% of American teens claim to be able to text blindfolded

"Teens say texting has critical advantages because it offers more options, including multitasking, speed, the option to avoid verbal communication, and because it is fun – in that order. With more than 1 billion text messages sent each day, it is no surprise that 42 percent of teens say they can even text blindfolded, the study revealed"
Source: Harris Interactive, 12th September 2008

In June 2008 Bloggers have been blogging for an average of 3 years

"Bloggers have been at it an average of three years and are collectively creating close to one million posts every day. Blogs have representation in top-10 web site lists across all key categories, and have become integral to the media ecosystem."
Source: State of the Blogosphere, Technorati, September 2008

US 13-29s send an average of 20 text messages a day each

"Members of Generation Y (ages 13 to 29) send an average of 20 text
messages daily, compared to just 2 for Generation X (30-43) and less than one
for Baby Boomers (44 to 64)"
Source: Knowledge Networks, 18th September 2008

Saturday 29 November 2008

13 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube every minute

"Today, 13 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube every minute, and we believe the volume will continue to grow exponentially. Our goal is to allow every person on the planet to participate by making the upload process as simple as placing a phone call. This new video content will be available on any screen - in your living room, or on your device in your pocket. YouTube and other sites will bring together all the diverse media which matters to you, from videos of family and friends to news, music, sports, cooking and much, much more."
Source: YouTube founder Chad Hurley, posting on Google's blog, 16th September 2008

28% of US & Western European mobile subscribers have a 3G device

"After a slower start than Western Europe, the United States caught up in adoption of 3G mobile, with 28.4 percent of American mobile subscribers having 3G devices vs. the average of 28.3 percent among the five largest Western Europe states"
Source: MarketingVox, 8th September 2008, citing data from comScore

Approximately 0.2% of websites have a mobile version

"Overall there are around 0.2% of web domains that have a mobile version. (This is not a precise figure but a rough estimation based on the millions of domains I've crawled)"
Source: MobiForge, August 2008

88% of UK searches are 'navigational'

"We’ve just updated our data on navigational / branded search in the UK for our new research report, Managing Your Brand Online. During May 2008, 88% of searches for the top 2,000 search terms in the UK were branded in nature, up from 81% in 2007 and 66% in 2005.
A quick refresher on the methodology that was used: we carried out an analysis of the top 2,000 search terms in the UK over the same 12 week period ending in May during 2005, 2006, 2007 and 2008, categorizing them into branded / navigational terms (e.g. ‘bebo’, ‘ebay’, ‘bbc’ – i.e. searches where there was a clear intention to search for a brand or reach a particular website) and non-navigational terms (e.g. ‘flights to spain’, ‘free games’, etc.). As we’ve highlighted previously, this trend towards more navigational / branded search at the ‘head’ of search terms contrasts with more sophisticated generic search behaviour in the long tail."
Source: Hitwise, 14th August 2008

NBC's online coverage of the Beijing Opening Ceremony was 10x more popular than their coverage of the Athens ceremony

"NBCOlympics.com garnered 70 million page views on 8/8/08, an increase of 900 percent and 10 times more than the opening day of the Athens Games in 2004 (7 million).
The 70 million page views are nearly 50 million more page views than the peak day in Athens (Day 4, 20.6 million).
NBCOlympics.com’s 4.2 million unique users show an increase of 496% over the unique users for the opening day of the Athens Games in 2004 (705,000).
Since August 1, 2008, NBCOlympics.com has accumulated more than 127 million page views, nearly half the TOTAL for the entire Athens Games
Source: LostRemote.com, 9th August 2008, citing data from NBC

There were 253m Chinese online by the end of June 2008

"By the end of June 2008, the amount of netizens in China had reached 253 million, surpassing that in the United States to be the first place in the world. This is according to a newly released Suvery Report by China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC).
This report, the 22nd Statistical Report on the Internet Development in China, also indicates the number of broadband users has reached 214 million, which also tops the world. The CNNIC also announced that, by the time of July 22, the number of CN domain names, which was 12.18 million, had exceeded .de, the country-code Top Level Domain for Germany, thus becoming the largest country code Top-Level Domain names in the world. These three major breakthroughs show a big Internet power is taking shape."
Source: CNNIC, 31st July 2008

More tweens in the US spend and hour a day online than with any other medium

"Tweens consume information through many channels, but the Internet leads. When asked how much time they spent with various media types, 83% said they spend at least an hour per day online, and 68% reported at least an hour per day watching TV. Radio, magazines and newspapers came in much lower with 29%, 10% and five percent indicating they spent an hour per day with these channels.
Nearly half of respondents go online many times per day (more than three), and 87% usually spend at least a half hour each time."
Source, ChiefMarketer, 29th July 2008, citing data from Doubleclick Performics

Over 28m people in India aged 15+ accessed the internet in May 2008

"Over 28 million people in India, age 15 and older, accessed the 'net from home and work locations in May — a 27 percent increase from a year ago.
This makes India one of the fastest-growing internet populations, according to comScore's first study of internet usage in India"
Source: MarketingVox, 24th July 2008, citing research by comScore

10m iPhone apps downloaded in the first weekend

"Apple® today announced that iPhone™ and iPod® touch users have already downloaded more than 10 million applications from its groundbreaking new App Store since its launch late last week. Developers have created a wide array of innovative mobile applications ranging from games to location-based social networking to medical applications to enterprise productivity tools. Users can wirelessly download applications directly onto their iPhone or iPod touch* and start using them immediately. More than 800 native applications are now available on the App Store, with more than 200 offered for free and more than 90 percent priced at less than $10."
Source: Apple, 14th July 2008

Apple sold 1m 3G iPhones in the first 3 days of release

"Apple® today announced it sold its one millionth iPhone™ 3G on Sunday, just three days after its launch on Friday, July 11. iPhone 3G is now available in 21 countries—Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Hong Kong, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, UK and the US—and will go on sale in France on July 17.
“iPhone 3G had a stunning opening weekend,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO. “It took 74 days to sell the first one million original iPhones, so the new iPhone 3G is clearly off to a great start around the world.”"
Source: Apple, 14th July 2008

14m new domain names were registered in the first 3 months of 2008

"In the first three months of 2008, the growth of the Internet remained steady as it added 14 million new domain names according to the first quarter 2008 Domain Name Industry Brief
published by VeriSign, Inc., the trusted provider of Internet infrastructure services for the networked world.
The close of the first quarter saw a total base of more than 162 million domain name registrations worldwide across all of the Top Level Domain Names (TLDs). This represents a 26 percent increase over the same quarter last year, and 6 percent growth over the fourth quarter of 2007. That pace of quarterly growth is about the same as the average quarterly growth rate from 2007."
Source: VeriSign, 16th June 2008

More than 8m people downloaded Firefox 3 in the first 24 hours of release

"Thanks to the support of the always amazing Mozilla community, we now hold a Guinness World Record for the most software downloaded in 24 hours. From 18:16 UTC on June 17, 2008 to 18:16 UTC on June 18, 2008, 8,002,530 people downloaded Firefox 3 and are now enjoying a safer, smarter and better Web.
Ever since Firefox was launched in 2004 we've relied on our community to help us spread the word, and thanks to projects including crop circles, newspaper ads, giant stickers, videos, blogs and more we now have over 180 million users in more than 230 countries.
Source: Firefox statement, June 2008

Approximately 80% of mobile phones on sale in the UK are web capable

"Here are the figures: over Ireland and UK operators there is a choice of more than 120 unique different handsets, for a total of nearly 280 choices.
Of this total:
82% are fully mobile web capable and should give a good user experience (like a Nokia 6300, Samsung E840, Sony-Ericsson W580i)
17% are capable but limited by screen size or poor software. (e.g. Sony-Ericsson W375, Nokia 3110)
1% are not capable, and anyway only available in pay-as-you-go and not targeted for web users. (e.g. Motorola W208, Nokia 1200) "
Source: MobiForge.com, June 2008

Japan has about 25% of the global mobile handset market by value

"About 25% of the global cellphone market in terms of cash value is in Japan. - Why? Japanese users want a lot more functions (navigation, mobile payment, QR code, mobile shopping, mobile music and video, mobile TV, ...), and are happy to pay much more per phone. Japan is a totally different game: while NOKIA has about 40% of global market, NOKIA's marketshare in Japan is almost zero."
Source: Eurotechnology Japan, 4th June 2008

Online advertising accounts for more than 10% of all ad spend in 7 European markets

"Online advertising accounted for at least 10 percent of overall advertising spending in Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Sweden and the UK, the report said.
Norwegian Internet users were the most expensive to target, with advertisers spending 133.20 euros per consumer reached, compared with the European average of 80.60 euros. In the United States, the average was 91.90 euros per person.
The sectors investing most in online advertising were entertainment and leisure, telecoms, and finance and insurance."
Source: Reuters, 2nd June 2008, citing data from the IAB/PWC

Friday 28 November 2008

63% of rural homes in the UK have broadband, compared to 57% of urban ones

"The regulator's regional communications market report shows that 59% of rural households have broadband compared to 57% of urban homes.
It is the first time that the country has overtaken the town, according to the report.
Four years ago urban dwellers were twice as likely to have broadband as those living in the country. "
Source: BBC, 21st May 2008, citing OFCOM research

UK online advertising revenues hit £2.8bn in 2007

"In 2007, online revenues rose £797m like-for-like, to reach £2.8bn. The rise represented a slowdown from growth of 41% in 2006 and 66% in 2005 but it outstripped the IAB's forecasts of 35%. That prediction was already ahead of most other forecasts, said the trade group."
Source: The Guardian, 8th April 2008, citing PwC/IAB

UK eCommerce spend reached €18.5bn in 2007

"The UK is well ahead of its European counterparts when it comes to online shopping, with sales reaching €18.5bn (£12.8bn) last year, according to Mintel. The company analysed internet retailing across five countries including the UK, Germany and France. Germany was the second biggest online spender with sales reaching €13bn (£12.8bn) last year. Meanwhile France (€7bn, £5.6bn), Italy (€1.1bn, £874m) and Spain (€1bn, £794m) lagged behind the two biggest markets"
Source: Mintel, cited by NMA, 31st March 2008

70% of American girls aged 15-17 maintain a social network profile page

"Girls have embraced social networking sites on a massive scale, with 70% of American girls aged 15-17 having built and regularly worked on a profile page on websites such as MySpace, Bebo and Facebook, as opposed to 57% of boys of the same age.
John Horrigan of the Pew Internet Project says these figures are likely to be echoed throughout the West. “The internet is a very expressive medium and you’re looking at times in a girl’s life when they are very socially expressive; the internet, and social networking particularly, enables that need,” he said."
Source: Pew Internet Project, cited in The Sunday Times, 9th March 2008

Pornographic terms represent 25% of all internet searches

Various statistics on this page including:
"Pornographic websites 4.2 million (12% of total websites)
Pornographic pages 420 million
Daily pornographic search engine requests 68 million (25% of total search engine requests)
Daily pornographic emails 2.5 billion (8% of total emails)
Internet users who view porn 42.7%
Received unwanted exposure to sexual material 34%
Average daily pornographic emails/user 4.5 per Internet user
Monthly Pornographic downloads (Peer-to-peer) 1.5 billion (35% of all downloads)
Source: Various, cited by TopTenReviews, 2006

Filipinos sent 1bn text messages daily in 2008

"Filipinos doubled the number of text messages they sent last year to an average of 1 billion daily, industry data showed on Tuesday.
The Philippines is one of the prolific text messaging centers of the world with even the central bank governor sending monetary policy statements via mobile phone and an increasing number of consumers using their handsets for banking and bill payments."
Source: Reuters, 4th March 2008, citing the Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co. (PLDT)

100bn minutes of calls made on Skype

"And now, Skype has served 100 billion minutes worth of Skype-to-Skype calls. Please, do quote me on that"
Source: Skype's blog, 13th February 2008

Over 85% of the online population has shopped online

"Over 85 percent of the global online population has used the internet to make a purchase, increasing the market for online shopping by 40 percent in the past two years, according to the Nielsen Global Online Survey on internet shopping habits"
Source: Nielsen Online, 30th January 2008

US Video game sales exceeded $17bn in 2007

"Video game sales topped $17 billion last year, according to the NPD Group, making 2007 by far the biggest year in gaming history.
These numbers mark a 43 percent increase year over year, solidifying the games industry's strong lead in growth over movie box office revenue, which totaled $9.7 billion at a 4 percent increase."
Source: Yahoo Games, 22nd January 2008

World of Warcraft has 10m subscribers

"Blizzard Entertainment, Inc. announced today that subscribership for World of Warcraft®, its award-winning massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG), has continued to climb, recently passing 10 million worldwide. Interest in the game has remained high in all regions, with thousands of new and returning players signing up through the holiday season. World of Warcraft now hosts more than 2 million subscribers in Europe, more than 2.5 million in North America, and approximately 5.5 million in Asia."
Source: Blizzard Entertainment press release, 22nd January 2008

Search marketing makes up 57% of UK online ad spend

"Marketers in the UK say search marketing is the most efficient way to generate leads - so it's no wonder that search marketing accounts for the lion's share of online ad spending compared with other formats, making up more than half (57 percent) of the online advertising dollar (so to speak) in the UK"
Source: MarketingVox, 14th January 2008, citing (ultimately) PwC/IAB research

$29bn spent online in the US from 1st November - 31st December 2007

"“This year’s online holiday shopping season has concluded with a record $29 billion in spending, a 19-percent gain versus year ago,” said comScore Chairman Gian Fulgoni. “Ultimately, the softness in the growth of online retail sales during the first ten days of November proved difficult to overcome and prevented the season’s growth rate from reaching our forecast of 20 percent. However, the period between Thanksgiving and Christmas -- another measure of the strength of the holiday season -- experienced a healthier 21-percent growth rate.”"
Source: comScore press release, 7th January 2008


Wednesday 26 November 2008

First Post

Years ago I went to see a headhunter to talk about getting a new job.

During the interview I said something like "I very numerate, but also very literate - I'm interested in both sides", to which he said "Yes, that is a problem, isn't it?" (exact quote).

No, it's not a problem, it's a good thing. & so while I have my long running Digital Examples blog to cover adverts, virals and sites, I'm now starting this new Digital Stats blog.

This blog will feature interesting and jaw dropping stats from the digital world. All stats will have a headline figure, a quote to show the figure in context, and a link to the original article.

It's clearly not exhaustive, and while I may be accused of 'lies, damned lies and statistics' it is meant to provide small, memorable facts about how the world is becoming more and more digital.

The aim, as with Digital Examples, is to be able to post in less than 5 minutes, so that I can post often and regularly.