Broadband and content

The American institute Pew has published another internet report Home Broadband Adoption and Online Content Creation. The conclusions are not surprising, but it is nice to see the impression we have in Europe as one of the densest broadband continents confirmed. Yes broadband yields more consumer generated content than dial-up access and broadband user generated content is not just for a broadband elite.

Home broadband adoption in the US grew by 40% from March 2005 to March 2006, twice the growth rate of the year before. Growth in broadband adoption has been very strong in middle-income households, and particularly fast for African Americans and those with low levels of education.

Broadband yields consumer generated content and in the US 48 million internet users have posted content to the internet and the large majority of them are home broadband users.
- Overall, 35% of all internet users have posted content to the internet. Specifically, we asked about four types of online content: having one’s own blog; having one’s own webpage; working on a blog or webpage for work or a group; or sharing selfcreated content such as a story, artwork, or video.
- An even higher percentage of home broadband users – 42% or about 31 million people – have posted content to the internet. They account for 73% of home internet users who were the source of online content.
- Having a fast, always-on internet connection at home is associated with users’ posting content to the internet and thereby shaping the environment of cyberspace.
- Although home dial-up internet users get involved in putting content online, they do not do so at the same rate as broadband users. Just 27% of dial-up users, or about 13 million adults, have placed some sort content online.
- Sharing a variety of creations online is among the most popular kinds of user generated content. Overall, 36 million internet users have shared their own artwork, photos, stories, or videos on the internet. That comes to 26% of internet users. Home broadband users account for about two-thirds of this number.
- Home is not the only place from which people upload content. Among the 11% of online Americans with access only at work or some place other than work or home (such as a library), 21% have posted some content to the internet. That comes to 5 million people.

User-generated content is not just for a certain class of high-speed internet users.
- When the Pew Internet and American Life Project first asked about user-generated content among early-adopter high-speed users in January 2002, a “broadband elite” of mostly male technophiles were responsible for most of this activity.
- Today, broadband users living in households earning under $50,000 in annual household income are slightly more likely than those in higher-income homes to say they put content online – by a 46% to 41% margin.
- User-generated content is driven by young home high-speed users. Fully 51% of “under 30” home broadband users have posted content to the internet compared with 36% of home high-speed users older than 30.

Tags: user generated content

Blog Posting Number: 394