Social communities and online games dominates U.S. Internet time

Americans spend almost a quarter of their time online on social networks and blogs. The time spent have increased by 43% since last year. A third of the time is spent on communication on social networks, blogs, email and instant messaging.

“Despite the almost unlimited nature of what you can do on the web, 40 percent of U.S. online time is spent on just three activities – social networking, playing games and emailing leaving a whole lot of other sectors fighting for a declining share of the online pie,” said Nielsen analyst Dave Martin.

• Online games passed email in terms of how much time spent on each activity and is now the second most time spending activity among U.S. users taking 10% of theirs total internet time.

• One of the most used services appeared to be film and TV streaming that passed the 10 billion mark in June 2010.  The average American Internet user streamed for 3 hours and 15 minutes during June.

Emailing remains on top among mobile Internet activities

Social networking on mobile devices has doubled but email activities still dominates the time spent by mobile surfers. 41,6% of the total time spent on the mobile net is spent on email services.  The second most time spending mobile activity is surfing on portals (11,6%). Social networks getting closer in terms of time spending, taking 10,5% of the total amount of time spent on the mobile Internet.

“Although we see similar characteristics amongst pc and mobile Internet use, the way their activity is allocated is still pretty contrasting, added Martin. While convergence will continue, the unique characteristics of computers and mobiles, both in their features and when and where they are used mean that mobile Internet behavior mirroring its PC counterpart is still some way off.”

Read the full story on Nielsen’s Blog