People Were More Likely To Google Themselves This Year

Ponca City, We Love You writes "More than twice as many Americans googled themselves in 2006 than five years previous — and many are googling their friends and romantic interests as well, according to a report released ecently by the Pew Internet and American Life Project. The survey shows that the percentage of US adult Internet users who have looked for information about themselves through Google or another search engine has more than doubled in the past five years (pdf) from 22 percent in August, 2001 to 47 percent in December, 2006. Only 3 percent of internet self-googlers say they Google themselves regularly, 22 percent say 'every once in a while,' and three-quarters say they have googled themselves once or twice. The original report, 'Digital Footprints,' contains many more interesting observations (pdf)."

Comments

Re:You may google my user name, not my given name

[swv3752]

If you only associate positive things with your name, it can help when potential employers do a cursory check on you.

Re:Ummmm

[Lumpio-]

They did a survey. The links in the article point that out quite clearly.

Re:Google?

[Torvaun]

Sometimes people are logged in to their iGoogle homepage. Then they search for a name that just so happens to match the one on their account. Google, being ever-so-crafty, figures out that they must be Googling themselves.