As redes sociais e o futuro da Internet

Este é um artigo de opinião de Bill Thompson, jornalista e comentador regular do programa "Digital Planet" da BBC, que reflecte sobre o impacto crescente das redes sociais na vida dos cibernautas.

O artigo
From here to cyberspace
Social networking sites are growing up and becoming much more than glorified address books, says Bill Thompson.

As Facebook opens up it is winning more fans About a year ago I asked my daughter, who was 15 at the time, if she would "ADD" me as a friend on MySpace so I could comment on her profile and be part of her online social network.
She refused point blank.
Not because she wanted to keep things secret, but because it would be unutterably naff to have your dad as a MySpace friend.
Recognising that she was right, I didn't push it.
She knows how to look after herself online - she's a member of the Childnet International children's' panel and helps write the guidance for other young people.
But yesterday she added me as a friend on Facebook, where she now has a profile too. Not only that, she has admitted in public that she is my daughter.
A brave step indeed.
In fact, I'm less concerned with her privacy now than I am with my own.
She's 16 and can look after herself, but now she has access to my online friendship network. Not only will she be able to see who I'm hanging out with, she'll also be able to send them all messages.

in BBC News - Technology

Europa on-line

Num dia normal, durante o mês de Abril, 122 milhões de europeus com 15 ou mais anos estiveram on-line, versus 114 milhões de americanos, revela um estudo da comScore sobre a actividade Internet na Europa.

O press-release

comScore Releases First Comprehensive Review of Pan-European Online Activity

Google most popular property in 13 of 16 countries tracked by comScore
U.K. and Swedish Web users spend more time online than U.S. counterparts
U.K. most active Internet users in Europe

LONDON, U.K., June 4, 2007 – comScore, a leader in measuring the digital world, today released the first comprehensive review of European Internet activity. The comScore World Metrix study reveals that on an average day in April 2007, there were 122 million Europeans age 15 or older online, versus 114 million in the U.S. The average European accessed the Internet from either a home or a work computer an average of 16.5 days in the month and spent a total of 24 hours viewing 2,662 Web pages.
The comScore study compares activity across the 16 countries where comScore tracks Internet usage with panel-based measurement and highlights the differences in Internet development by country. This harmonized view of European online visitation reveals the following:

• The Netherlands and Scandinavian countries have the highest percentage of their populations using the Internet, ranging from 68 percent to 83 percent.
• Germany has the largest online population: 32.6 million people age 15 and older.
• The U.K. has the most active online population, with the highest average number of daily visitors (21.8 million), the highest usage days per month (21 per user), and the highest average time spent per month per user (34.4 hours).
• European users average 16.5 usage days per month. Countries that have usage days below the European average are Russia (11.4 average usage days), Austria (12.0), Italy (12.9), Ireland (13.0), Portugal (13.4), Norway (14.7), Denmark (14.7), Switzerland (15.1), Belgium (15.5) and Finland (16.4).
• The average Swedish user views 4,019 pages per month and views more pages than any other country – 51 percent above the European average of 2,662 pages per month.

“This marks the first time we have released this detailed of a portrait of Internet usage across the 16 countries, making these comparisons truly revealing,” commented Bob Ivins, managing director of comScore Europe. “Such comparisons are only possible due to the consistency of our panel-based methodology country-to-country.”
The study also revealed that Google is the most popular property in 13 of the 1p6 countries, followed by Microsoft in most countries. Yahoo! remains the 3rd most popular property across Europe, despite making the top 3 list in only three countries – Ireland, Italy and Spain.

in comScore, Inc.