the unique audience in India – and even china – is higher than in many of the european countries. certainly than in Japan.

Wow. Compelling data.

I’m not so surprised at the lower usage in japan and Germany but I’m surprised Switzerland is as low in the ranking as it is.

Wait until China is allowed to play.

Insightful ! , any stats on India ? knowing whether people are accessing through PCs or Mobiles would also be a good insight .

This is interesting “Australia Leads in Average Time Spent per Person on Social Media Sites in December”

But Australians use social media sites like facebook and twitter as social networks to talk to their friends and not like they do in other countries as a media tool to share news, reports, stories and so on, Australians still don’t get it, most government departments don’t want to know about it, and only in the last six months businesses have started using social media tools as social marketing tools.

And I should add the majority of people using Twitter in Australia are marketers and bloggers that want everyone to know about them, they don’t really care about the social media part of it, it’s all about them.

Australian bloggers use twitter as a Digg type of site so they can share their content and nothing else.

I think to put this research in a complete global context, Africa should be captured in the publication.

There is already a close correlation between the rising number of obese Americans and the number of hours they spend in front of the TV and playing video games every day. Is it fair to say that social networking will only contribute to the trend? Do we as Americans really need another excuse to stay inside and remain inactive all the while ignoring the people in our homes that we are already neglecting by spending too much time participating in activities that require no physical activity and really minimal social activity. Cant we talk to the people in our own homes? I do enjoy using Facebook but at what point do we say enough is enough and actually enjoy some real human contact. You know we all need physical human contact to survive physically and mentally. When was the last time you actually touched someone or were touched by someone?

Wow…I cannot believe how much facebook has managed to increase its number of users as compared to the rest. Also, I see that MySpace is the ony one which has gone down….
Very interesting!

I think social media is only for youngsters is for all those who love to connect with people socially , professionally etc . The numbers will surely keep going up in 2010 as there are more social media sites coming up eZdia where you not only connect with people but also earn money from your expertise by doing freelancing. eZdia.com is a social , professional networking as well as freelancing site . I think in 2010 its going to play a big role and a threat to the existing social media sites.

This is exactly why businesses need to capitalize and begin using these social media sites to gain a professional advantage. If you look up a business now a days and they don’t have a facebook or twitter account it’s as if they automatically lose some of their legitimacy. The media company I work for has just embarked on a new Internet Marketing journey and the reviews from clients have been astounding, everyone is getting into this social networking.

Those social media are not free of time. Japanese are mostly spending time while commuting (school, work or else) and rather through mobile – which makes facebook not so useful in there. Swiss are just not into social media – culturally or just matter of time, whatsoever.

Social media takes too much time, I can do it to share with family and friends but I still need to make money at the end of the day…

Social media isn't only for young people. The fastest growing Australian social network for over 50s is About My Agehttp://www.aboutmyage.com . It's ranked in Google's top 10 searches. Older people want to interact with their own generational community and they spend more time online. They don't hit and run like youngsters. They can spend hours chatting in About My Age chat rooms.

That's because the population of India is many times more than the population of European countries, and of Japan. Also, there are more people with internet accesss in India than in China, I think.

Interesting to see the breakdown in terms of age and will this carry through as people get older, i.e. do teenagers using Myspace migrate to Facebook and Twitter and then to LinkedIn as they move through their working lives. Obviously some social networking sites end up targeted a particular demographic.

Great info especially for social media marketers. I would have liked to see India as well included in the study. I think a lot of Indians too are participating in such social networks.

Great data! I use Social Media now for everything, business and personal. Really thoughtful comments as well, regarding futher demographic breakdowns and analysis. On a web anthropology level, I believe it a more socially interactive trend to see social media use rising, while T.V time dropping!

Apparently, if you add it all up, we're spending 400 lifetimes a day on Facebook:
http://www.nanaroo.com/400-lifetimes-lost-on-face...

Cheers,
Matthew Campbell
Nanaroo.com

Hey guys. l am from China. Chinese goverment denied facebook in China, we can visit facebook via TOR or other network-break tool only….so terrible…

Very interesting stats. It's September now, Facebook has gone over 500,000,000 pages and now has an audience that spends more time than does Google. Very interested to see next year's numbers.

Many of your commenters have blank icons. Here's a link to a short video showing exactly how to get their faces instead. http://powerlinetraining.com/personal-branding-wi...

Great info especially for social media marketers. I would have liked to see India as well included in the study. I think a lot of Indians too are participating in such social networks

Wow…I cannot believe how much facebook has managed to increase its number of users as compared to the rest. Also, I see that MySpace is the ony one which has gone down….

This is interesting. I wonder are there any numbers for China? Am surprised CH is so low.

This information reflects the current online activity in my household. We spend more time on Facebook playing games and we hardly ever check our emails!

It seems that everything can be tracked. With this in mind, can it be determined how often an indivdual in one country is communicating w/ a person in a different country. If so, wouldn't this bring us closer together? We would know more about each other, allowing us to understand one another. It would make for less prejudice and a better world.

Why are we spending more time on facebook or other social network than on websites where we can learn some positive things for our society and our community. People are changing the ways to see things and to use internet. I can wait to see this year increase rate of ppl spending on social network

That's because the population of India is many times more than the population of European countries, and of Japan. Also, there are more people with internet accesss in India than in China, I think…

That{s pretty interesting, I believe social media will developed to be a sub version of the internet, a micro cosmos of personally relevant bits of info.

We will see.