Robyn Greenspan

April is not only known for its showers, but it is also the time of year when Americans report their incomes to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), and many are opting to file online this year. Reports from the IRS indicate that there has been a 12 percent leap in the number of returns filed […]

Dialing up is on the downswing, as 55 percent of all adult Internet users have high-speed access either at home or work, and 39 percent of adult surfers have a broadband connection at home. DSL is largely responsible for home broadband growth, as Pew Internet & American Life Project reports that DSL subscriptions have catapulted […]

Audio and video Internet streams [define] are becoming more commonplace, as AccuStream iMedia Research reports increased usage during 2003 and the first quarter of 2004. “…streaming media is very much mainstream content now. Audiences over the years have become very educated, there is more residential broadband, there have been so many huge news events, from […]

The largest U.S. minority is increasing its online presence, creating huge opportunities for marketers, a recent study finds. Hispanics, relative latecomers to the Internet, have quickly integrated the medium into their lives by shopping, communicating, and performing advanced Web activities. The second annual America Online/RoperASW U.S. Hispanic Cyberstudy identifies the Hispanic market as one that […]

There have been no new epidemics reported of Internet users rushing online for health information, according to research from Harris Interactive, which found “cyberchondria” nearly flat in the February 2004 report. Harris Interactive calculated that 111 million adults have looked for health information on the Internet, compared to 109 million in 2003 and 110 million […]

The volume of unwanted messages inched up another percentage point during March 2004, pushing the spam ratio to 63 percent. Of the 93 billion messages Brightmail’s Probe Network filtered during the month, 58.6 billion were identified as spam. Unsolicited product-related messages continue to garner the largest piece of the spam pie, while scam messages experienced […]

Various forms of media are trying to co-exist as consumers increasingly display the ability to multitask. An October 2003 survey from The Media Center at the American Press Institute and BIGresearch indicates that 70 percent of consumers use different forms of media simultaneously, while Mobium Creative Group found that as many as 83 percent of […]

Internet searchers have had food and sports on their minds, as Lycos and Yahoo! have chronicled in their respective compilations of the weekly search terms. “Weight Watchers” weighed in at #1 on The Lycos 50 for the week ending March 27, 2004, with “Atkins Diet” following at #6 and “South Beach Diet” at #10. Dean […]

Local online ad spending is expected to rise 28.7 percent to more than $2.6 billion — twice the growth rate of overall Internet advertising — according to the just released projections from Borrell Associates’ WebAudit. These findings represent a dramatic change, considering it was only two years ago that the research firm reported that local […]

A collaborative report released today by the Online Publishers Association (OPA) and comScore Networks, Inc. found that 18 to 34 year-olds were the most connected age group, spending more time online and accounting for more page views. The group, specifically the male half, has been the subject of intense scrutiny by media buyers and planners, […]

The annoying unwanted messages that overflow inboxes are now also spreading onto desktops in the form of SPIM [define] — spam over instant messaging (IM). The Radicati Group estimates that SPIM will account for roughly 5 percent of instant messages traversing public networks (consumer and corporate) by the end of 2004, tripling from 400 million […]

The Internet equals profits for more than half of the 400 small businesses (SBs) that participated in an eBay-commissioned survey, conducted by ACNielsen, and a small portion reported that without the Web, they wouldn’t have a business. While 51 percent of the respondents indicated that the Internet has improved their profitability, 58 percent said the […]