Internet users 2012
Internet World Stats has released new Internet User figures for mid-year 2012. The number of Internet users in all world regions as well as the population and the graphs were updated at the Big Picture page.
1,000 Million Smartphones in Use in the World
Smartphones in use in the world reached over 1,000 million, according to third quarter figures released by research firm Strategy Analytics Inc. The number of smartphones in use increased by around 330 million from the third quarter of 2011 and by 79 million from the second quarter of this year.
It took 16 years to gain the first billion smartphone users, however it is expected that only three years will be needed for that number to double to 2 billion. More smartphone penetration is expected in the future, specially in emerging markets such as China, India and Africa.
New Zealand Internet Use
The total number of mobile phone subscriptions in New Zealand increased by a third to more than 2.5 million over the past year. “Smartphone use is rising quickly and people are increasingly connecting to the Internet using these devices wherever they go,” said New Zealand’s information and communication technology statistics manager Hamish Hill.
Statistics New Zealand produces reports of Information and Communication technology (ICT) surveys. Results for the next ICT reports, the Business Operations Survey, and the Household Use of ICT Survey will be released in March 2013. New Zealand Internet Stats can be seen at Internet World Stats.
Country Codes – ISO 3166
Since the very beginning (11 years ago), at Internet World Stats we have always used the ISO 3166-1 alpha-2 country codes to identify the over 233 countries we cover. The use of standards is always the best decision and the best practice. It helps you to avoid future problems.
The country codes found in ISO 3166-1 are used by many organizations, businesses and governments. For example all national postal organizations throughout the world exchange international mail in containers bearing its country code for identification. In machine readable passports, the codes from ISO 3166-1 are used to determine the nationality of the user. In addition, Internet domain name systems use the code to define top level domain names such as ‘fr’ for France, ‘au’ for Australia, ‘br’ for Brazil and so forth.
Click this link for further reading about the use of ISO 3166 and visit IWS to see the full country list.
3,500 million Internet Users for 2017
Forrester Research forecasts 50% Internet Penetration and 3,500 million Internet users in the world for year 2017.
Inbound Marketing News
Hi everyone, I have just started a new blog about Inbound Marketing. It will be, I am sure, both interesting and fun, as well as useful. Some of you will wonder, what has Internet Marketing to do with Internet Stats and what is Inbound Marketing all about? I invite you to read a short definition at Inbound Marketing News.
Japan Has A Population Problem
Government stats confirm that the population in Japan is contracting. This was reported by Internet World Stats several months ago. You can see that the 2011 population figure of 126,475,664 for Japan expected to decrease to 93,673,826 by the year 2050.
Government projections show the birth rate will hit just 1.35 children per woman within 50 years, well below the replacement rate. Academics have created a population clock to highlight the population fall and encourage public debate on the issue.
Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/world/2012/05/11/lack-babies-could-mean-extinction-japanese-people/?cmpid=GoogleNewsEditorsPicks&google_editors_picks=true#ixzz1uk2fIiyC
Africa Internet Stats
Sometimes its good to know how the Internet World Stats are being used. Here is a good example of a blog from Africa by our friend Michael Ouma, a Journalist from Kenya.
Of course other people and other companies are also doing excellent Internet market research in Africa. For example, Google has been working with UK market research firm Basis Research Ltd. the last two years to understand behaviors and attitudes regarding the Internet in Africa.
They interviewed over 13,000 people in six cities of Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria, Senegal, South Africa and Uganda – to find out how and why people use the internet, what prevents non-users from coming online, and much more. The results are available at InsightsAfrica (www.insightsafrica.com)
The Global Village
It was Marshall McLuhan the man who coined the term “Global Village” in the early 1950s. Today, the term is a noun in most dictionaries and it refers to the shrinking world, home to all nations and peoples living interdependently.