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Facebookers Poking Around 7 Hours a Month, Nielsen Finds

by Warren Riddle on February 18, 2010 at 09:10 AM

Despite contradictory evidence from the teen demographic, some researchers have asserted that the time people spend online has maxed out. A recent Nielsen study has indicated that, at least during January, that may actually be correct -- with one site being a notable exception.

According to the Nielsen stat gurus, the total number of active Web users increased in January, but people still spent less time on the Net as a whole, including major sites like Google, Yahoo!, Microsoft, AOL, Amazon, and eBay. The people surveyed didn't necessarily minimize their online time, though; they primarily redirected their attention to Facebook, the reigning ruler of the Internet.


People flocked to Facebook in January, as the average user spent a staggering seven hours on the site over the course of the month. That's almost a 10-percent increase from the usage numbers for December. The next closest time-killer during January was Yahoo!, which lagged behind with a comparatively paltry two hours per user. While the Facebook offices must be rejoicing over the dominant numbers, you can expect a horde of shaking fists from the rest of the Web community, and, even more so, from bosses everywhere. [From: Nielsen]

Tags: Facebook, internet usage, InternetUsage, nielsen, nielsen ratings, NielsenRatings, socialnetworking, top, web

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