Americans Using Internet 'Just for Fun'
Ant writes "CNET News.com reports that nearly one-third of American Internet users go online just for fun." From the article: "A survey of 1,931 Internet users conducted by Pew Internet & American Life Project in late November and December 2005 found 30 percent of respondents said they went online "for no particular reason" on the previous day. That was up from 21 percent in a November 2004 survey. The survey also showed that 34 percent of online men were surfing for fun on an average day in December, compared with 26 percent of women."
December seems like the month that has the most goofing off in it in general, in the lead up to Christmas. I wonder if they'd get the same numbers if they ran the survey this month.
I run a Video blog site, and some of my favorite users are those who just show up to mess around ... like these guys from Canada or this gentleman in Korea (apparently currently visiting China)
The internet's great for "work", but it's not bad for just pure entertainment and relaxation either. Beats the hell out of TV, in any event.
Mooniacs for iOS and Android
> "one-third of American Internet users go online just for fun."
According to my ISP (CenturyTel) the Internet exists solely for "entertainment and education".
Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
The internet once was the domain of us old-school geeks. Now everybody and anybody is on and driving it to ruin.
One only need look at all the trolling which has infested USENET newsgroups.
It's time to create a new net for geeks only.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Ah yes. I know it seems impossible, especially for those who've failed statistics & probabilies classes, to make target populational inferences from a survey population. But it is quite possible and quite common.
Using well-established statistics and probability, it is mathematically safe to say that within some given margin of error--three percent is common--that if you asked every single Anerican the same question, their responses would match the surveyed population.
Note that this populational response accuracy does not speak to whether the question is formed in a neutral, accurate manner that elicits meaningful responses from the survey population. The statistical accuracy can just say that given this (well-formed or poorly-formed) question, this target population's response will follow the survey population's response.
Hahaha! Porn pornity porn porn porn! The joke here is that the internet has porn on it! Haha! I made a funny. Excuse me a moment while I go change my pants.
Please, people!
At any rate, it's another one of those surveys that attempts to rigorously show what we all already know. People use the internet as a medium for social interaction. Whoopee.
I'm a little worried, though, that computer users answered "fun" because they had no idea what they were doing on the internet. That's probably unfounded, though. Most of them are probably members of the thronging myspace jackass horde.