World Wide Web Now Serving Over 1 Billion Users

If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Read my top posts or learn more about Michael Gray. Want more frequent updates follow me on Twitter. Thanks for visiting!

According to Usability Guru Jakob Nielsen the internet now has over One Billion Users

Some time in 2005, we quietly passed a dramatic milestone in Internet history: the one-billionth user went online. Because we have no central register of Internet users, we don’t know who that user was, or when he or she first logged on. Statistically, we’re likely talking about a 24-year-old woman in Shanghai.

According to Morgan Stanley estimates, 36% of Internet users are now in Asia and 24% are in Europe. Only 23% of users are in North America, where it all started in 1969 when two computers — one in Los Angeles, the other in Palo Alto — were networked together.

It took 36 years for the Internet to get its first billion users. The second billion will probably be added by 2015; most of these new users will be in Asia. The third billion will be harder, and might not be reached until 2040.

In 2002, NUA estimated that we had 605 million Internet users. Since then, Internet use has grown by 18% per year — certainly not as fast as the 1990s, but still respectable.

Overall, the Internet’s growth has been truly remarkable. Ten years ago, the ‘net was mostly used by geeks; now it’s the default way to do business in many countries. In our U.S. and European B2B studies, many business professionals said they visit a company’s website as the first step in researching potential vendors.

Aside from having some great statistics you can now quote and reference in any client proposals you need, what’s the point?

Well one of the things that makes a guru or pundit truly exceptional is that they can make wonderfully eye catching, quotable, and news worthy claims that seem true, but are for all intents and purposes completely unverifiable. That ladies and gents is another example of how to get some free link love.

Categories:( jakob.nielsen | jakob.nielsen | seo | seo | search.engine.optimization | search.engine.optimization | link.development | link.development)

Added: Less than 24 hours later this post is now on Digg

One Response to “World Wide Web Now Serving Over 1 Billion Users”

1. Vic Says:
   April 8th, 2007 at 3:30 pm

   Somewhat differing, but all the same, fairly interesting and useful statistical data on global Internet usage for 2007, as measured by comScore available here:

   http://www.comscore.com/press/release.asp?press=1242