NetGuide

The 2009 NetGuide Telecom Survey reveals not only how people are getting online to source their news and entertainment, but also just how many of us are looking for love (and finding it) on the World Wide Web.

Keeping the Piece

It seems that Internet downloading is an increasingly popular way of getting music.

Fifty-nine percent of the survey’s respondents said that they download songs off the Internet.

Sixty-two percent of those who answered the question said that they download music off the Internet on a monthly basis.

A further 30% said they download music on a weekly basis, with just 5% saying that for them it’s a daily occurrence.

Whether the popularity of getting music online is due to the recession or the fact that downloading music is just so easy these days, the figures show that the online environment is increasingly the place where people want to source their media.

Searching for Love

If it is the recession that’s encouraging online music downloading, then it may be what accounts for the growth in popularity of online dating Web sites too.

While only 9% of those polled said they had an online dating profile, the poll also revealed that 24% of those who did visited an Internet dating site on a daily basis.

While 20% of survey takers said that they had never even visited a dating site, of those who visited regularly, 28% did so on a weekly basis, with another 28% only checking their profile monthly.

The statistics show that it’s a great way to meet people, too. Fifteen percent of respondents said that they have met face-to-face with someone they met online.

And if you think that Internet love has to be fleeting, think again. Thirty-four percent of survey takers know someone who is married to someone they met online.

News you can use

Rupert Murdoch recently announced that his companies are going to start charging for at least some of their online content.

But just how much of our news comes from the Internet? The answer is: plenty.

Fifty-seven percent of people surveyed said that they get the majority of their news online. Twenty-three percent said that they get most of their news from television, with just 14% and 7% getting it from newspapers and radio respectively.

Even though the Internet is a popular source of news content, it doesn’t mean that people have abandoned hard copy publications entirely though. Only 35% said that they’ve actually cancelled their subscriptions, with 65% saying that even though they can read news online, they still subscribe to newspapers and magazines.