Despite having 2.5m twitter followers Soulja Boy sold just 13,000 copies of his new album in the first week

"What do 2.5 million Twitter followers get you? If you're Soulja Boy, it gets you a barely tepid 13,000 in first-week sales of your new album and a debut at No. 90 on the Billboard 200. "The DeAndre Way" sold 2,000 digital copies and 11,000 physical in the United States, according to SoundScan, in the week following its Nov. 30 release. His last album, "iSouljaBoyTellem" (2008), sold 45,000 the first week -- 2,000 digital and 43,000 physical.
Now to be fair, Soulja Boy is very much as singles artist. "Crank Dat (Soulja Boy)" was the 14th best-selling digital song of all time with more than 4.6 million downloads. But even the first single from "The DeAndre Way" -- "Pretty Boy Swag" -- didn't stack up, with 590,000 downloads since it first went on sale in June. Track sales from the new album total 718,000."
Source:  Billboard, 17th December 2010

A day in the life of online mums

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Source:  Microsoft Advertising, 2010

The iPhone 4 is rumoured to have sold 600,000 units in China

"A report from inside China Unicom yesterday said that to date the operator has sold nearly 600,000 iPhone 4 handsets. More than 700,000 users pre-ordered the phone, meaning another 100,000 pre-orders are yet to be filled."
Source:  Marbridge Daily/Oriential Morning Post, 17th December 2010

Digital services account for 25% of UK record industry revenue

"BPI figures for the 12 months ending in September 2010 show that digital services now accounts for a big slice of UK record industry revenue - 24.5%, up from 19.2% a year earlier.  Rising levels of income from digital music are not offsetting declining revenues from falling CD sales, however.
Innovation is helping to drive growth beyond the traditional a la carte music purchase model pioneered by market leader iTunes.  18% of digital income now comes from a mixture of subscription services – like those offered by Napster and eMusic – and the ad-supported services including Spotify and We7."
Source:  BPI Digital Music Nation Report, December 2010
Download the full report here

The ten most-used words (actually phrases) in LinkedIn profiles in the US in 2010

"Top 10 overused buzzwords in LinkedIn Profiles in the USA – 2010
Extensive experience
Innovative
Motivated
Results-oriented
Dynamic
Proven track record
Team player
Fast-paced
Problem solver
Entrepreneurial"
Source:  LinkedIn, 14th December 2010

8.1m people in the UK have downloaded a podcast

"The latest research commissioned by radio audience measurement body Rajar reveals that 8.1 million people in the UK – 16% of the adult population – have downloaded a podcast, with nearly half of them (44%) listening to such a service at least once a week.
The popularity of smartphones is also changing the way we listen to the radio: 6.6 million adults (13% of the population) have listened on their mobile phone at least once, and 2.2 million downloaded a radio app, a 57% increase in less than six months. The last survey, in May, put the download figure at 1.4 million.
But it's not an entirely digital experience – more than half of people listening to the radio on their mobile did so using a specific preset on analogue FM, compared with 16% running an app for a specific station.
The research, carried out by Ipsos Mori last month, also suggested that 16.3 million people have listened to the radio via the internet, and 12.7 million have used a listen-again service such as the BBC's iPlayer."
Source:  The Guardian, 15th December 2010

The top 50 passwords used by Gawker readers

Click to enlarge

Source:  WSJ blog, 13th December 2010
Note - Data comes from hackers who were able to access the site and extract the passwords.
Passwords in red are the names of Gawker sites - e.g. people were using the name of the site as their password

New investment in Twitter values it at $3.7bn

"Twitter has raised $200m (£129m) in new finance, in a deal that values the social networking service at $3.7bn.
It said the investment had come from venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield Byers, and existing investors.
Twitter is also adding two new board members, including David Rosenblatt, boss of digital advertising group DoubleClick.
[...]
It has 175 million registered users and 300 employees."
Source:  BBC News, 15th December 2010

The top 10 videos on YouTube 2010

"Globally, as of November 2010, the most-watched YouTube videos (excluding major label music videos) were:
BED INTRUDER SONG!!!
TIK TOK KESHA Parody: Glitter Puke - Key of Awe$ome #13
Greyson Chance Singing Paparazzi
Annoying Orange Wazzup
Old Spice | The Man Your Man Could Smell Like
Yosemitebear Mountain Giant Double Rainbow 1-8-10
OK Go - This Too Shall Pass - Rube Goldberg Machine version
THE TWILIGHT SAGA: ECLIPSE - Trailer
Jimmy Surprises Bieber Fan
Ken Block's Gymkhana THREE, Part 2; Ultimate Playground; l'Autodrome

And globally, as of November 2010, the most-watched major label music videos were:
Justin Bieber - Baby ft. Ludacris
Shakira ft. Freshlyground - Waka Waka (This Time for Africa) (The Official 2010 FIFA World Cup Song)
Eminem - Love The Way You Lie ft. Rihanna
Eminem - Not Afraid
Rihanna - Rude Boy
Justin Bieber - Never Say Never ft. Jaden Smith
Justin Bieber - Never Let You Go
Lady Gaga - Alejandro
Justin Bieber - Somebody To Love Remix ft. Usher
Lady Gaga - Telephone ft. Beyonce"
Source:  YouTube, reported by The Independent, 14th December 2010

British police say that over 100,000 crimes have been linked to Facebook since 2005

"Crimes linked to Facebook reached more than 100,000 across the country in the last five years, it emerged yesterday.
Police chiefs in 16 forces revealed that 7,545 calls from the public since January were concerned with the social networking site.
Callers have alerted officers to alleged acts of terrorism, sudden deaths, missing pets and even firearms offences.
Facebook users have used to site to detect crimes ranging from terrorism to missing pets
Frauds, sexual offences and hate crimes were also reported to police, as well as a large number of malicious messages on the site.
The figures have been obtained by the Daily Mail via Freedom of Information Act requests to forces.
They compare to just 1,411 calls related to Facebook to police in the whole of 2005, when the network began to gain popularity."

Source:  Daily Mail, 14th December 2010

Spotify's top tracks & top albums in the UK in 2010

Top tracks
1. Lady Gaga – Telephone
2. Bob – Airplanes [feat. Hayley Williams of Paramore] - Explicit Album Version
3. Lady Gaga – Bad Romance
4. Mumford & Sons – The Cave
5. Rihanna – Rude Boy
6. Mumford & Sons – Little Lion Man
7. Florence + The Machine – You’ve Got The Love
8. Jason Derulo – Ridin’ Solo
9. Usher featuring will.i.am – OMG
10. Iyaz – Replay
11. Florence + The Machine – Dog Days Are Over
12. Jay-Z – Empire State Of Mind [Jay-Z + Alicia Keys] - Explicit Album Version
13. Ellie Goulding – Starry Eyed
14. Journey – Don’t Stop Believin’
15. Katy Perry – California Gurls (feat. Snoop Dogg)
16. 3OH!3 – STARSTRUKK - FEAT.KATYPERRY
17. Ke$ha – TiK ToK
18. Train – Hey, Soul Sister
19. Lady Gaga – Alejandro
20. Tinie Tempah – Pass Out
Source:  Spotify, December 2010 - follow the link to see the top 100.


Top albums
1. The Fame Monster by Lady Gaga
2. Lungs by Florence + The Machine
3. Sigh No More by Mumford & Sons
4. xx by The xx
5. Rated R by Rihanna
6. Jason Derulo by Jason Derulo
7. Animal by Ke$ha
8. THE E.N.D. (THE ENERGY NEVER DIES) by Black Eyed Peas
9. The Element Of Freedom by Alicia Keys
10. The Blueprint 3 by Jay-Z
11. Lights by Ellie Goulding
12. Only Revolutions by Biffy Clyro
13. Sunny Side Up by Paolo Nutini
14. brand new eyes by Paramore
15. The Sound Of The Smiths by The Smiths
16. My Worlds by Justin Bieber
17. I AM…SASHA FIERCE by Beyoncé
18. Turn it Up by Pixie Lott
19. The Family Jewels by Marina and The Diamonds
20. Shock Value II by Timbaland
Source:  Spotify, December 2010 - follow the link to see the top 100.

79% of American mothers are active on social media

"The US-based study found that 79% of all moms with children under the age of 18 were active on social media. The study broadly defines active as someone who currently belongs to a social network, or who reads, writes or comments on blogs.
Marketers will want to perk up for these next results: 23% of these social media moms have purchased a children’s product as a result of a review or recommendation they read on social media. And the most active moms are even more influenced by their online social networks, with 43% of those who log on at least once a day report purchasing based on a review they read online.
Of those who report purchasing a children’s product because of something they read on their social networks, 55% said that this recommendation came directly from a personal review blog – not a corporate-sponsored Twitter account or online advertisement on the side of Google search.
And Facebook is, of course, a huge influencer as well. 40% of the moms who report purchasing something because of what they read online said that the recommendation that drove them to make the purchase came from Facebook."
Source:  Data from NPG Groiup, reported by Social Times, 13th December 2010

72% of Britons access social networks while in bed

"Web-obsessed Britons spend an average of 16 minutes surfing their social networks while laying in bed, a study shows.
A survey reveals that 72 per cent of people update their social networking profiles from bed
The survey, conducted by Travelodge, found that 72 per cent of adults update their social networking profiles from under the duvet, spending an average of 16 minutes per night checking Facebook, Twitter and other social sites.
The peak time for bed-based social networking was found to be 9.45am, with 18 per cent of those questioned admitting to accessing Twitter at that time."
Source:  The Telegraph, 14th December 2010

More than 50% of internet users in Africa use mobile as their main internet connection

"Data from mobile survey company, On Device Research, has put some meat on the bones of some industry received wisdom – that people in emerging markets overwhelmingly used mobile devices and not the PC to connect to the internet.
Here are the main stats.
The percentage of mobile internet browsers who never or infrequently use the desktop Internet
US - 25%
UK - 22%
Egypt - 70%
India  - 59%
South Africa - 57%
Ghana  - 55%
Kenya  - 54%
Nigeria  - 50%
Indonesia  - 44%
Thailand  - 32%
China  - 30%
Russia  - 19%
Asia (India, China, Indonesia, Thailand) - 43%
Africa (South Africa, Egypt, Ghana, Nigeria, Kenya) - 56%
* Infrequent mobile internet browsers use it once a month or less"
Source:  Data from On Device Research, reported by Mobile Entertainment, 14th December 2010

The most popular terms mentioned in Facebook status updates 2010

Click to enlarge

Source:  Facebook blog, 14th December 2010
Note - HMU stands for 'Hit Me Up' which basically means 'Talk To Me' or 'Invite Me To Something'
You can see examples of this being used here.

Americans spend as much time online as they do watching TV (Updated & disputed)

"Americans are now spending as many hours online as they do in front of their TV screens, according to a survey released by Forrester on Monday.
The average American now spends roughly 13 hours per week using the Internet and watching TV offline, Forrester finds, based on its survey of more than 30,000 customers. The Internet has long captivated the attention of younger Americans to a greater extent than TV and is now proving more popular to Gen X (ages 31 to 44) for the first time ever. Younger Baby Boomers (ages 45 to 54) are spending the same amount of time per week using both media.
While the amount of time Americans spend watching TV has remained roughly the same in the past five years, Internet use has increased by 121% in the same time frame."

Source:  Data from Forrester Research, Inc, reported by Mashable, 13th December 2010
Update - some beg to differ:
"The problem is Forrester’s findings don’t remotely square with existing measurement on TV and internet usage. While the study found that in January and February of 2010 consumers reported spending 13 hours per week on both TV and internet, data from Nielsen and comScore (NSDQ:SCOR - News), arguably the most reliable sources for measurement of TV and internet usage, offer a markedly different picture.
ESPN plans to meet Wednesday with Forrester, which counts the sports juggernaut as a client, to share its concerns. “Our fundamental concern is that, in a very confusing media landscape, we’re trying to answer very important questions about the behaviors of consumers,” said Dave Coletti, vice president of digital media research and analytics at ESPN (NYSE:DIS - News). “It’s imperative that we answer questions with the right methods.”
In the first quarter of 2010, Nielsen clocked weekly usage at 38 hours and 44 minutes, nearly three times what Forrester found. Over the same time frame, comScore’s account of internet usage was 7 hours and 24 minutes, about half of what Forrester found.
Why these numbers are so divergent cuts to the heart of the difficulties ESPN has with this Forrester study. The Forrester numbers are entirely based on self-reporting, or what the 30,000 respondents to the survey say is their consumption habits. But that’s a subjective metric different from the kind of metered measurement Nielsen and comScore do. They may have their own well-documented faults, but are at least they’re objective.
But what’s more troubling to Glenn Enoch, vice president of integrated research at ESPN, is that in media-research circles, self-reporting is known to be notoriously slippery. “It’s something we’re generally careful about,” he said.
To wit: In a Video Consumer Mapping study conducted last year by Ball State University Center for Media Design that is widely regarded as a landmark piece of research, one of the key findings noted, “Serious caution needs to be applied in interpreting self-report data for media use. TV was substantially under-reported while online video and mobile video usage were over-reported.”"
Source:  Yahoo Finance/PaidContent, 15th December 2010

The PC game World of Warcraft: Cataclysm sold 3.3m copies in the first day

"Blizzard Entertainment on Monday said that the latest chapter in its winning "World of Warcraft" online computer game franchise sold more than 3.3 million copies in just 24 hours on the market.
"Cataclysm" snatched the crown for fastest-selling computer game from "Wrath of the Lich King" software released in 2008 as the second expansion to the franchise.
[...]
More than 12 million people worldwide pay monthly subscription fees to play the massively multi-player online role-playing game."
Source:  AFP, 14th December 2010

Google has 59% of the US mobile advertising market

"Google garnered 59 percent of a U.S. mobile advertising market worth $877 million in 2010, thanks largely to the search ad business the company claimed was operating at a $1 billion run-rate this year.
Market researcher IDC said Apple was the runner-up at 8.4 percent of the U.S. ad spend, which rose 138 percent from the $368 million spent last year. Millennial Media collected 6.8 percent of revenue share for the year.
IDC analyst Karsten Weide added search and display ad revenues to calculate total market share. Weide, who factored in Google's $1 billion search ad run-rate, said Google's 2010 gross revenue will be $519 million. Apple will tally $73.5 million while Millennial will bank $60 million."
Source:  IDC data, reported by eWeek, 12th December 2010

49% of blogs indexed by Technorati are written by people who live in the US

Click to enlarge

Source:  Technorati State of the Blogosphere Report, 13th December 2010
Note - not all blogs are listed by Technorati.
Other findings in the report are even less representative, as their survey is only filled in by some bloggers, and is written in English, so massively skews towards English language bloggers.

Mobile game Angry Birds has been downloaded 50m times in 1 year

"Angry Birds has now hit 50 million downloads and over 10 million on Android. He also confirmed Angry Birds will be coming to the PC, Mac and other gaming consoles and there will be some new things “happening online” in the new year."
Source:  Techcrunch, 10th December 2010
Note - Angry Birds was launched on 11th December 2009

Over 15m votes were cast during the 2010 series of X Factor

"The X Factor sparked a £5m phone vote bonanza after more than 15 million votes were cast during the course of the series won by Matt Cardle last night.
A total of 15,488,019 votes were cast during the seventh season of Simon Cowell's ITV1 show, which peaked with a record of nearly 20 million viewers on Sunday.
The figures, published for the first time today, revealed that Cardle won every round of voting apart from the first, when he was beaten into second place by Mary Byrne.
Viewers voted by phone or via the red button, with landline and red button votes costing 35p each, but votes from mobile phones were likely to cost substantially more.
But even at 35p, the total number of votes translates to revenue of more than £5.4m, with proceeds split between Simon Cowell's Syco production company, the programme's co-producer Fremantle Media, broadcaster ITV and the phone vote operator, Harvest Media.
The total revenue, however, is set to be much higher once mobile phone votes are taken into account. How the revenue is divided between the four parties remains a closely kept secret."
Source:  The Guardian, 13th December 2010

The 2010 X Factor Final achieved the highest non-sport UK TV audience for 9 years

"The X Factor final attracted a record audience of almost 20 million viewers last night, ITV said.
The broadcaster said that the series notched up the biggest non-sport audience on any channel since 2001.
A peak of 19.4 million (a 60% share of TV viewers) tuned into see Matt Cardle take this year's crown on ITV1 and ITV1 HD.
The two-hour show, which kicked off at 7.30pm, was seen by an average of 17.2 million, a 55% share.
Both figures are records for the X Factor, which this year has been dogged by controversy.
[...]
The previous X Factor record - a 19.1 million peak and 15.5 million average - was achieved last year. ITV said last night's show was the biggest non-sport audience since 2001, when the Only Fools And Horses Christmas Day special attracted around 21 million on BBC1.
Source:  Press Association, 13th December 2010

84% of iPad owners say that keeping up with news is their main use of their tablet

"Among 1,600 iPad owners polled by the Reynolds Journalism Institute this fall, 84.4% identified keeping up with news and current events as a main use of the new tablet. Leisure reading (81.5%) was not far behind, followed closely by browsing the Web (80.8%).
In terms of engagement, a massive 78.6% report spending at least 30 minutes a day with news content on the iPad. In this same group, only 52.5% spend the same time with news on TV, while 50.7% spend that much news consumption time on the PC. In fact, 48.9% of iPad owners are reporting that they are engaged in news reading for one hour or more on a typical day. Irrespective of just news consumption, the large majority of owners (62.7%) says they spend at least an hour in a typical day with the device.
One reason news consumption may skew so high in this survey over other content categories is the extreme gender skew of the device among these respondents – 80.2% male. That high percentage may be an anomaly for this survey. A previous Yahoo survey of iPad users also found a male-skewing demo, but at the much lower rate of about 60%. For now at least, the iPad owner fits the early adopter profile: 55.6% making over $100,000 in household income; 76.3% with college degrees or better; and 69.5% ages 35 to 64."
Source:  Min Online, 10th December 2010

Top Twitter Trends 2010

OVERALL TOP TRENDS
1.Gulf Oil Spill
2.FIFA World Cup
3.Inception
4.Haiti Earthquake
5.Vuvuzela
6.Apple iPad
7.Google Android
8.Justin Bieber
9.Harry Potter & the Deathly Hallows
10.Pulpo Paul

NEWS EVENTS
Gulf Oil Spill
Haiti Earthquake
Pakistan Floods
Koreas Conflict
Chilean Miners Rescue
Chavez Tas Ponchao
Wikileaks Cablegate
Hurricane Earl
Prince Williams Engagement
World Aids Day

PEOPLE
Justin Bieber
Dilma Rouseff
Lady Gaga
Julian Assange
Mel Gibson
Lil Kim
Zilda Arns
Kate Middleton
Kim Hee Chul
Joannie Rochette

MOVIES
Inception
Harry Potter & The Deathly Hallows
Scott Pilgrim vs. the World
Despicable Me
Karate Kid
The Last Airbender
The Twilight Saga: Eclipse
The Expendables
The Chronicles of Narnia
Paranormal Activity 2

TELEVISION
MTV Music Video Awards
Pretty Little Liars
True Blood
Walking Dead
Grammy Awards
Glee
Family Guy
CSI
MTV Movie Awards
American Music Awards

TECHNOLOGY
Apple iPad
Google Android
Apple iOS
Apple iPhone
Call of Duty Black Ops
New Twitter
HTC
RockMelt
MacBook Air
Google Instant

WORLD CUP
FIFA World Cup
Vuvuzela
Pulpo Paul
Dunga
Diego Maradona
Cristiano Ronaldo
Cala Boca Galvao
Lionel Messi
Oranje
Felipe Melo

SPORTS
Lebron James
Wimbledon
Manchester United
Brock Lesnar
Celtics
Brett Favre
Tony Parker
Antonio Margarito
Blake Griffin
Mike Vick

HASHTAGS
#rememberwhen
#slapyourself
#confessiontime
#thingsimiss
#ohjustlikeme
#wheniwaslittle
#haveuever
#icantlivewithout
#thankful
#2010disappointments

Source:  Twitter's Year in Review, December 2010

Twitter grew by more than 100m accounts in 2010

"In 2010 Twitter grew by more than 100m registered accounts"
Source:  Twitter's Year in Review, December 2010

It took CityVille 8 days to reach 6m players (updated)

"Zynga’s newest game, CityVille, is the fastest growing game in the company’s history. But we already knew that. It had nearly 300,000 players in the first 24 hours, and 3 million daily active users in its first week.
But it’s growth ramp keeps on going crazy. Now, not quite two days after it hit the 3-million user mark, it is already at 6 million daily active users, we’ve learned from the company. To put that in perspective, that is four times faster than it took FrontierVille to get to 6 million daily active users, and more than five time faster than it took FarmVille.
Time It Took To Get To 6 Million Daily Active Users
FarmVille: 46 days
FrontierVille: 32 days
CityVille: 8 days"
Source:  Techcrunch, 11th December 2010
Update - 22m in 11 days

It took six days for twitter followers of celebrities like Justin Timberlake & Lady Gaga to raise $1m for Africa

Tweet on 1st December:

Tweet on 6th December:

Full information:

Update - The gossip site Popbitch has a different take on the story:
"Neatly proving just how ineffective social media actually is, 18 celebrities (and Jay Sean) sacrificed their "digital lives" for charity last week, vowing to stop updating their Twitter and Facebook feeds. Social network silence from Lady Gaga, Alicia Keys, Justin Timberlake and others until their fans donated a million dollars to the Keep A Child Alive campaign to help fight AIDS.
With six days gone, donations were still under $300k. The celebs got restive - Usher just plain gave up and started tweeting - so a billionaire patsy, and longtime AIDS funder Stewart Bahr, was drafted in to pay it off.
It would have cost the celebs' 35 million combined followers less than 3 cents each to buy back their lives and get them tweeting again, so it appears their fans are staunchly pro-AIDS, or no-one really cared very much about what they had to say in the first place.
FYI Serena Williams inadvertently summed up the campaign's biggest problem in her last tweet and testament: "[It means] no more news about me winning more Grand Slams, selling books, winning gold medals, owning AMAZING football teams or pioneering fashion until we raise some serious cash". Is it any wonder people wanted her silenced? http://bit.ly/huo25w  "
Source:  Popbitch newsletter, Issue 526, 9th December 2010

Last.fm made a loss of £2.84m in 2009

"Last.fm has just published its financial report for 2009 on Companies House in the UK, revealing a loss for the financial year of just under £2.84 million.
The company ended 2009 with net liabilities of £22.24 million, but says parent company CBS continues to “make available such funds as are needed” by the music service.
Last.fm’s turnover for 2009 was £7.28 million, up from £4.19 million in 2008. However, its cost of sales was £7.2 million in 2009, down from £8 million in 2008. That meant Last.fm reported a gross profit of £86,322 in 2009, compared to a gross loss of £3.81 million in 2008.
[...]
Of that £7.28 million, £5.37 million came from advertising sales – 73.7%. A further £1.3 million came from subscriptions (17.9%), with just over £0.6 million coming from affiliate sales (8.4%).
Geographically, 54.8% of Last.fm’s revenues in 2009 came from the UK, with 33.5% coming from the US, 9.4% from EU countries, and 2.3% from the rest of the world (right – click for larger). Last.fm’s headcount fell from an average of 79 in 2008 to 55 in 2009, according to the report."
Source:  Music Ally, 3rd December 2010

70% of European online sales come from just 3 countries

"Seventy per cent of European online sales are from just three countries, new research has found.
FACT-Finder, an ecommerce specialist, found that the big three are the UK, with €48bn in annual sales, Germany, with €39.2bn and France with €25bn.
At the same time, cross-border trading is a challenge for many online stores, said the report. Cultural differences mean that despite the physical closeness of countries such as France and Germany, advertising campaigns do not translate across borders and few of their online stores trade beyond national boundaries.
There’s also, said FACT-Finder, a lack of consumer confidence in buying from different countries, while complex VAT requirements make it difficult for smaller brands and retailers to sell across the European Union.
The fastest growing, though currently the smallest, online market in Europe is Poland, which generates €3.6bn in sales but has grown by 36%^ in 2010, compared to the same time in 2009. The FACT –Finder report singles this out as the market with the greatest potential since its retailers are more aware of the opportunities offered by the internet."

Source:  Research by FACT-Finder, reported by Internet Retailing, 3rd December 2010

The most-used words in 5 star and 1 star iPhone app reviews

"I wrote a script to crawl U.S. App Store customer reviews for the top 100 apps from every category (minus duplicates) and compute the most common words in 1-star and 5-star reviews, excluding words that were also common in 3-star reviews.
Keep in mind that the results are not representative of overall user opinions: most users don’t review apps, and people who dislike an app are more likely to leave a review than people who like it.
These are the top words by rating, with descending frequency:
*****:
awesome, worth, thanks, amazing, simple, perfect, price, everything, ever, must, ipod, before, found, store, never, recommend, done, take, always, touch
*:
waste, money, crashes, tried, useless, nothing, paid, open, deleted, downloaded, didn’t, says, stupid, anything, actually, account, bought, apple, already
Bold words are adjectives or likely to be used as adjectives in context."
Source:  Blog post by Marco Arment, 12th September 2010

The top 10 places on Foursquare in the US

Based on the number of checkins, week ending 28th November 2010 (Includes Black Friday)

Click to enlarge

Source:  AdAge, 29th November 2010.  Updated stats here.

Samsung has sold 600,000 Galaxy Tabs

"According to a report from Korean newspaper The Korean Herald, Samsung has confirmed global sales numbers for its virgin tablet offering. In its first month of availability, the Android-powered Samsung Galaxy Tab has sold 600,000 units — likely making it the most popular Android tablet in the world. Samsung is reportedly pleased with the Galaxy Tab’s performance in its premier month, saying demand outpaced supply in most markets."
Source:  BGR, 22nd November 2010

China has 39m 3G subscribers

"China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) yesterday revealed that as of the end of October, China had reached 38.64 mln 3G mobile subscribers."

Source:  Beijing Times, reported by Marbridge Daily, 26th November 2010

The mobile game Angry Birds has been downloaded 36m times

"With more than 36m downloads under its wing, Angry Birds has quickly become a mobile gaming phenomenon.
And now the popular puzzler is set to move into the living room, with versions for the Xbox 360, PS3 and Wii scheduled for a 2011 release.
In less than a year, Angry Birds has captured the imagination of millions of smartphone owners. Its simple premise, where birds are catapulted into different structures hiding egg-stealing pigs, brought more than 2m downloads in the first weekend alone."

Source:  The Guardian, 24th November 2010

China has 842m mobile phone subscribers and 300m fixed line phone subscribers

"Total telephone subscribers saw a net increase of 7.56 mln in October, with mobile subscribers growing by 8.74 mln to 842.04 mln, and fixed-line subscribers dropping by 1.18 mln to 300.09 mln. Broken down by traditional fixed-line and PHS, the PHS subscriber base declined by 1.17 mln subs to 31.65 mln, while traditional (i.e. non-PHS) fixed-line subscribers decreased by 20,000 to 268.44 mln.
A total of 67.38 bln SMS messages were sent during the month of October, bringing the total for the first 10 months of 2010 to 685.27 bln, a 6.8% increase over the figure during the same period of 2009."
Source:  China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) figures for ~October 2010, reported by Marbridge Daily, 24th November 2010

Roughly one UK home in three has a Nintendo Wii

"Nintendo has been boasting about how many people own a Wii console in the UK, based on data gathered by Chart Track.
EuroGamer reports that the Chart Track figures indicate that since its launch, 8.3 million Wii consoles have been sold in the UK. With the total number of UK households put at 24.9 million by the ONS, that works out at bang on a third of the population."
Source:  Tech Watch, 4th October 2010

Spotify UK makes 60% of its revenues from subscriptions

"Here are highlights of the 2009 financial accounts for Spotify Limited, its UK-headquartered arm that is really the guts of the operations:
- The operating loss was £16.4 million for 2009 as a whole
- Net loss after taxation was £16.66 million
- Revenues for 2009 were £11.32 million
- Cost of sales was £18.82 million
- Distribution was £608,711
- Administrative expenses were £8.29 million
Spotify’s revenue by category was:
- £4.51 million from sales of advertisements in 2009, just under 40% of revenue
- £6.81 million from subscriptions, just over 60% of revenue
- At the end of 2009 it had 23 employees
- Staff costs were £1.17 million"
Source:  Techcrunch Europe, 22nd November 2010

In 2009 more virtual roses were sold in the UK by Flirtomatic than real roses by Interflora

"The currency has quickly found favour among the growing and increasingly engaged online gaming community – and not just inside Facebook, the world's most popular social network. Flirtomatic, a social network with 1.8 million users in the UK, sold more virtual roses last year than Interflora sold real roses. Earlier this month, more than 100,000 Flirtomatic citizens "attended" its virtual firework display – online."
Source:  The Guardian, 19th November 2010
Via Interesting Snippets

There are 506m mobile subscriptions in Africa

"The number of active mobile subscriptions in Africa crossed the half-a-billion mark in the third quarter of this year, to reach 506 million at end-September, according to research by UK-based Informa Telecoms & Media.
The report, published on the researcher’s website said at the end of the third quarter of this year, Africa accounted for 10% of the world’s mobile subscriptions and was one of the world’s fastest-growing regions – with the subscription numbers increasing 18% over the year to September."
Source:  Data from Informa Telecoms & Media, reported by PeaceFM Online, 14th November 2010
[Note - the story is not easily accessible on the Informa website]

Call of Duty: Black Ops generated $650m in revenues in the first 5 days

"Activision announced today that the latest release in the venerable franchise tallied over $650 million in worldwide revenue, according to internal figures, easily besting the previous record set by predecessor Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 of $550 million.
Activision CEO Bobby Kotick said that with the new mark, "Call of Duty has become the first entertainment property in history to set five-day launch records for two consecutive years across all forms of entertainment."
The feat, Activision claimed in its statement, bested any release in "theatrical box office, book, and video game sales." But that comparison might be unfair. The average hardcover book usually launches for around $25 or $30, while the average movie ticket costs about $10. Call of Duty: Black Ops on the Nintendo DS retails for $30, but PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 versions of the game cost at least $60. It's a sizable difference.
When it comes to online play, Call of Duty: Black Ops performed just as well. According to statistics Microsoft furnished to Activision, over 2.6 million people played the title on Xbox Live on launch day. All told, over 5.9 million hours were logged on Xbox Live on the first day the game was available. Last year, Modern Warfare 2 was played for 5.2 million hours on launch day."

Source:  CNET News, 18th November 2010

3m apps are downloaded from Nokia's Ovi store per day

"Nokia today announced that its Ovi Store has reached 3 million downloads per day, a milestone spurred by overall global demand and a recent update that gives users of Nokia's new Symbian smartphone family a friendlier look and feel as well as more popular apps and games. The company is also gaining significant software developer momentum with more than 400 000 new developers joining Forum Nokia in the past 12 months, and 92 surpassing the million download milestone for their apps."
Source:  Press release from Nokia, 18th November 2010

Expandable ads are more effective than non-expandable ones

"For years, we’ve had great metrics – 6% avg. interaction rates, 15+ second avg. brand time, 2% click-through rate – but we haven’t always known what that means. Do these active users take action down the funnel? Does it really matter if the ad expands if we can’t tell what happens after they engage? A new PointRoll/Compete Research study has answered that question. And the answer is clear.
“We looked at how rich media display ads perform across various brand and response metrics and verticals and found statistical validation that expandables outperform non-expandables in every category we measured, including brand engagement, site visitations and search,” said Stephen DiMarco, Chief Marketing Officer of Compete.
The numbers look like this:
View-through reporting: Expandables outperformed non-expandables by an average of 64% and by as much as 108%.
Driving key purchase indicators (KPIs): Expandables outperformed non-expandable by an average 43% and by as much as 115%.
Driving brand search: Expandables outperformed non-expandables by an average of 39% and by as much as 155%.
Driving third party research site visitation: Expandables outperformed non-expandables by an average of 49% and by as much as 180%."
Source:  Research by PointRoll/Compete, reported in the PointRoll blog, 10th November 2010

Online ad spend hit $6.4bn in the US in Q3 2010

"Online advertising revenues in the U.S. hit $6.4 billion in Q3 2010, representing a 17 percent increase over the same period in 2009, according to estimates presented moments ago by the Interactive Advertising Bureau in tandem with PricewaterhouseCoopers.
This marks the highest quarterly result ever for the industry.
This is not the first time IAB and PwC got to announce record numbers this year.
Last month, they said Internet advertising revenues in the U.S. were at $12.1 billion in the first half of 2010, setting a new half-year record that represented an 11.3 percent increase over the first half of 2009."
Source:  Techcrunch, 17th November 2010

Japanese social network Mixi delivers 84% of its page impressions to mobile users

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Source:  Page 11 of Ten Questions Internet Execs Should Ask & Answer, Morgan Stanley, 16th November 2010

Total annual global online advertising expenditure is equivalent to $46 per internet user

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Source:  Page 16 of Ten Questions Internet Execs Should Ask & Answer, Morgan Stanley, 16th November 2010
[Note - figures are estimates]

The most checked into places in the UK on Facebook

Current top 10:

1 - Alton Towers
2 - O2 Arena
3 - Emirates Stadium
4 - Old Trafford
5 - London Eye
6 - Trafalgar Square
7 - Tate Modern
8 - Leicester Square
9 - Buckingham Palace
10 - City of Manchester Stadium
Source & dynamic list of the top 50:  Visit Britain's Facebook page
Retrieved 17th November 2010

Chinese microblogging site Weibo has more than 50m users

"At the first China Microblogging Developers Conference this morning, Chinese internet company Sina's (Nasdaq: SINA) Weibo microblogging platform announced that it now has more than 50 mln users. Approximately 25 mln microblog updates are posted to the service every day; to date, the site hosts more than 2 bln microblog postings, and has formed partnerships with more than 10,000 other sites."
Source:  Marbridge Daily, 16th November 2010

10% of the Daily Mail's UK traffic is generated by referrals from Facebook

"Martin Clarke, the Daily Mail executive who runs Mail Online, revealed today that 10% of the website's UK traffic is generated by referrals from Facebook, a "gigantic free marketing engine".
Clarke told delegates at the Society of Editors annual conference in Glasgow that only Google directs more UK traffic to Mail Online and urged newspapers to embrace social networking sites including Facebook and Twitter.
"The social networks are becoming increasingly important to us," Clarke said. "If you want an engaging site, Facebook isn't a threat or a parasite but a gigantic free marketing engine.""

Source:  The Guardian, 15th November 2010

The global average click through rate (CTR) is 0.09%

"In its new Global Benchmark Report, MediaMind explores data showing that one of the major contributors to the decline in CTR for Standard Banners in recent years was the near financial meltdown following the collapse of Lehman Brothers in September 2008. In fact, average global CTR declined from 0.11% in July ‘08 to 0.09% in October ’08. The good news is that in 2010, this downward trend has stopped at 0.09%.
Paradoxically, one of the major underlying reasons for the decline in CTR is the success of online display advertising and the exponential increase in the number of banners that users are exposed to. MediaMind found that users who are exposed to relatively few ads are more likely to have a high CTR as compared to users who are exposed to a high number of ads. The decline in CTR happens even though in absolute terms, users who are exposed to a high number of ads click more."
Source:  MediaMind blog, 16th November 2010
[Note - 0.09% CTR means that you get 9 clicks per 10,000 ad impressions]

Zoe Griffin makes £80,000 a year out of blogging and related activities

"Making money out of a blog is complicated. Approximately 40% of my revenue is from adverts. Depending on the size of the ad, I can charge between £500 to £1000 a month. I make approximately £200 a month through affiliate schemes like Skimlinks and Buy.at, where you pick banner ads and internal links to online stores and earn commission if someone buys as a result.
As a consultant, I charge an hourly rate to write blogs for fashion and beauty brands and earn anything from £500 to £1500 a month for each. I am advising a new lifestyle website www.gocitygirl.com about ways to get girls engaged with gossip, where I charge an hourly rate of £100/hr. I organise celebrity parties where I get paid between £2500 and £5000. I am often a talking head on TV programmes and Breakfast News, which is £100-£150 a time. I write features about celebrity destinations for Ryanair magazine which is a free holiday and approximately £400."
Source:  Stylist, November 2010
[2 other examples are given in the article]
[Hat-tip - Honk]

Microsoft sold 1 million Kinects in the first 10 days

"Microsoft has just announced it has sold more than 1 million units of Kinect for Xbox 360 worldwide in the first 10 days after the product’s launch.
Additionally, Microsoft says it’s pacing to sell more than 5 million units by the end of the year. This news comes just a week after Sony visualized sales figures for its Kinect competitor, PlayStation 3 Move.
When you consider that Kinect for Xbox 360 won’t even reach most of Asia until November 18 and Japan until November 20, the 1 million units in 10 days figure is even more impressive."
Source:  Mashable, 15th November 2010

Microsoft's Gaming & Devices division generated a profit of $382m in Q3 2010

"We are beginning to see the latest financial results come in from the various publicly traded game-related companies come in for the last fiscal quarter. Today Microsoft announced that its Entertainment and Devices division, which includes its Games For Windows and Microsoft Games Studios business, brought in $382 million in profits for the quarter that ended on September 30.
A lot of that money came from the sales success of Halo Reach, Microsoft's latest Xbox 360 game in the long running shooter series. However Microsoft, as we have been reporting for the last few months, has been beefing up its PC game portion of the division, announcing new PC exclusive titles like the upcoming Age of Empires Online, as well as an upcoming revamp for its Games For Windows PC game download business."
Source:  Big Download, 28th October 2010

Levels of music streaming and music downloading are roughly equal in the US

"In the United States, music downloads and streams were nearly even in terms of popularity in August, according to NPD Group’s latest numbers, and are likely now in a dead heat. Downloads to Mac and Windows computers increased from 29 percent in March to 30 percent in August, said an NPD Group spokesman (who declined to be named because only NPD analysts can be quoted officially), while 29 percent of Americans streamed music in August, up from 25 percent in March. (In such studies, a one point difference is within the margin of error.)
These stats paint a clear picture.
Not only is music streaming growing faster than music downloading in the United States, but if the trend continues it will become the dominant computer music listening behavior in this country in a matter of months — and that’s before you take into account smartphone and television streaming.
The tipping point from downloading to streaming took place in France earlier this week, and these numbers indicate that we’re next."
Source:  Data from NPD Group, reported by Evolver,fm, 11th November 2010

Call of Duty - Black Ops generated $360m in revenue in the first day

"The biggest ever Videogame franchise in history has officially got bigger with the latest announcement by Activision that Treyarch’s Call of Duty – Black Ops officially beat the record set by its previous installment (Modern Warfare 2) in one day sales in North America and Europe.
The record held by Modern Warfare 2 for a little under a year was $310 million; this has been superseded by Black Ops to the tune of $360 million. A whopping $50 million increase in sales. Equating this to actual copies sold, Black Ops has sold 5.6 million units versus Modern Warfare 2’s 4.7 million. “I have every confidence that Tuesday’s sales are just the first milestone in what will be a tremendous year for Call of Duty and for our company,” said Activision COO and CFO Thomas Tippl."
Source:  Tech n Gadgets, 12th November 2010

Worldwide smartphone sales grew by 96% Y-o-Y in Q3 2010

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"Worldwide mobile phone sales to end users totaled 417 million units in the third quarter of 2010, a 35 percent increase from the third quarter of 2009, according to Gartner, Inc. Smartphone sales grew 96 percent from the third quarter last year, and smartphones accounted for 19.3 percent of overall mobile phone sales in the third quarter of 2010.
“This is the third consecutive double-digit increase in sales year-on-year, indicating that consumer demand is healthy,” said Carolina Milanesi, research vice president at Gartner. “This quarter saw Apple and Android drive record smartphone sales. Apple's share of the smartphone market surpassed Research In Motion (RIM) in North America to put it second behind Android while Android volumes also grew rapidly making it the No. 2 operating system worldwide.”"
Source:  Press Release from Gartner, 10th November 2010

What Women Want

A good presentation with lots of stats about women in Europe, by Laura Chaibi at Yahoo

Yahoo! What Women Want

View more presentations from Laura Chaibi.

Source:  Yahoo Europe, posted in November 2010

35 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube per minute

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"Remember in March when we shared with you that more than 24 hours of video being uploaded to YouTube every minute? Well, you continue to amaze us: you’ve increased the amount of video uploaded to YouTube to 35 hours per minute. That breaks out to 2,100 hours uploaded every 60 minutes, or 50,400 hours uploaded to YouTube every day. If we were to measure that in movie terms (assuming the average Hollywood film is around 120 minutes long), 35 hours a minute is the equivalent of over 176,000 full-length Hollywood releases every week. Another way to think about it is: if three of the major US networks were broadcasting 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year for the last 60 years, they still wouldn’t have broadcast as much content as is uploaded to YouTube every 30 days."
Source:  YouTube blog, 10th November 2010

There are over 175m cable TV subscribers in China

"Pang Jingjun, deputy director of Development Research Center at China's State Administration of Radio, Film and Television (SARFT), announced on November 1 that the number of residential cable TV subscribers in China exceeded 175 mln households, accounting for one-third of residential cable TV subscribers worldwide. "
Source:  Marbridge Daily, 10th November 2010

Nearly a quarter of display ads seen in the US are on Facebook

"Nearly one of every four graphical, online display ads viewed in the United States in the third quarter was on Facebook's website, according to a new report by Web analytics firm comScore.
Facebook's 23.1 percent share of display ad impressions was up sharply from 17.7 percent in the second quarter, and more than double that of the No. 2 ranked company, Yahoo Inc, which had 11 percent share.
In fact, Facebook's website racked-up more ad impressions in the third quarter than the next four companies combined, which includes Yahoo, Microsoft Corp, News Corporation's Fox Interactive Media and Google Inc, according to comScore."
Source:  comScore data, reported by Reuters, 8th November 2010

Fashion site Asos sells 40,000 branded and own-label products

"Asos now attracts nine million unique visitors a month, sells 40,000 branded and own-label products and claims to have 3.7 million registered users. In the six months to 30 September, overseas sales rocketed by 120 per cent to £49m, compensating for slightly less stratospheric growth in the UK."
Source:  The Independent, 9th November 2010

Music eCommerce site Topspin makes 75% of its revenues from physical products

"According to information shared with Digital Music News, a whopping 75 percent of Topspin revenues involve some sort of physical product.  "We're beyond the one-size fits all product world - thankfully," said Topspin CEO Ian Rogers, discussing the numbers at New Noise Santa Barbara.  "What we see is, 50 percent of what we sell is digital, and 50 percent of it contains something physical.  The 50 percent that contains something physical is 75 percent of revenues, or more."
Sounds astounding, except when you consider the value of higher-end, higher-priced stuff.  These premium goods carry great margins, and for artists with serious fans, it can all add up.  "You can definitely add a lot of money to any campaign by just adding some limited edition goods that are at a higher price point," Rogers continued."
Source:  Report in Digital Music News, 9th November 2010
[Note - presumably if a ticket is sold, and it's a physical ticket, then this counts as 'physical']

Piracy in Spain cost rights holders €2.5bn in the first half of 2010

"Piracy in Spain cost legal content rights owners 5.2 billion euros in the first half of 2010, more than triple the 1.56 billion euros in revenue earned by the digital content industry in the same period, according to a report released Wednesday.
According to Observation of Piracy and Consumption of Digital Content Habits study, conducted by IDC Research for the Madrid-based Coalition of Content Creators and Industries, the music sector was the hardest hit, with 97.8% of consumption derived from illegal downloads -- estimated at some 2.7 billion euros.
Some 77% of movie downloads, worth 1.87 billion euros, were done illegally, while video games same illegal downloads grow from 52.3% from the second half of 2009 to 60.7% in the first six months of 2010. The study concluded that piracy cost the gaming sector some 262 million euros."
Source:  Research by IDC, reported by The Hollywood Reporter, 3rd November 2010

There are 2.7 million downloads a day from the Ovi store

"Content
There are 2.7 million downloads a day with an average of 2.6 apps downloaded per visit
About 90% of the daily traffic to Ovi Store converts to downloads
85% of the signed in visitors to Ovi Store are repeat visitors
Each active user is averaging 8.5 downloads per month
Active users in 190+ countries
Games continue to be #1 for paid downloads and apps continue to be #1 for free downloads
90% of mobile consumers now have Ovi Store in their local language
Publishers from more than 90 countries are distributing their content through Ovi Store
Devices
More than 135 devices are supported, 80 are Symbian devices
6 of the top 10 downloading devices are touch devices: 5800 XpressMusic, N97, N97 mini, 5530 XpressMusic, 5230 Nuron, and X6 where available
Prominent Eseries devices included E63, E71 and E72
The 5130 XpressMusic and 2700 classic are the top downloading Series 40 devices
Markets
The most active countries in alphabetical order are: China, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Saudi Arabia, Thailand, Turkey, UK and Vietnam
Over 80% of these consumers can purchase from Ovi Store using their local currency
In countries where mobile billing is available, more than 2/3 of customers choose this payment option
With support for 30 language variations, 90% of Ovi Store visitors are using their local language when available"
Source:  Forum Nokia, as of 28th October 2010

US House and Senate election winners generally had more fans than the losers

"With most of Election Night’s races already decided, the Facebook political team took a look at whether Facebook “likes” did help predict the 2010 House and Senate winners.
The Data
 More Fans Equals 74% Winning Percentage in Key House Races
Facebook tracked 98 of the most hotly contested House races, as decided by leading political observers, and 74 percent of the candidates with the most Facebook fans won their races:
· 69 candidates with the most Facebook fans won· 24 candidates with the most Facebook fans lost
· 5 races are still too close to call
More Than 80% of Senate Wins Foreshadowed on Facebook
Just over 82 percent of the 34 Senate races that have been decided were won by the candidate with more Facebook fans:
· 28 candidates with the most Facebook fans won
· 6 candidates with the most Facebook fans lost
· 3 races are still too close to call
House Democrat Incumbents Lost on Facebook Before Losing on Election Day
So far, 46 House Democrat incumbents lost their seats yesterday. More than 78% of those incumbents had fewer Facebook fans than their challengers:
· 36 incumbent House Democrats who lost their seat had fewer fans then their Republican challenger
· 10 incumbent House Democrats who lost their seat had more fans than their Republican challenger"
Source:  Facebook, 3rd November 2011

4% of online Americans use location-sharing services like Foursquare

"In its first report on the use of “geosocial” or location-based services, the Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life project finds that 4% of online adults use a service such as Foursquare or Gowalla that allows them to share their location with friends and to find others who are nearby. On any given day, 1% of internet users are using these services.
[...]
Key findings include:
- 7% the adults who go online with their mobile phone use a location-based service.
- 8% of online adults ages 18-29 use location-based services, significantly more than online adults in any other age group.
- 10% of online Hispanics use these services – significantly more than online whites (3%) or online blacks (5%).
- 6% of online men use a location-based service such as Foursquare or Gowalla, compared with 3% of online women."
Source:  Pew Internet & American Life Project, 4th November 2010

64% of bloggers describe themselves as "hobbyists"

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"Penn Schoen Berland conducted an Internet survey from September 21-October 8, 2010 among 7,205 bloggers around the world. The margin of error for the survey is +/- 1.2% at the 95% confidence level and larger for subgroups. The following audiences are included throughout this report:
All: Entire sample of bloggers
2010 Respondents: Entire sample of bloggers surveyed September 21-October 8, 2010
N=2,828 / MoE= +/- 1.8
Blogger Audiences
Hobbyists (64%)  N=4623 / MoE= +/- 1.4
Currently report no income from their blog
Part-Timers (13%)  N=972 / MoE= +/- 3.2
Receive compensation for their blogging, but do not consider it their full time job
Corporates (1%)  N=74 / MoE= +/-11.4
Blog full-time for company or organization
Self Employeds (21%)  N=1535 / MoE= +/- 2.5
Blog for their own company or organization"
Source:  Technorati's State of the Blogosphere Report 2010, October 2010

There is a correlation between women's searches in the UK for dating and for cosmetics

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Source:  Rising Trends in Online Dating (Jan-Jun 2010), The link between online dating and beauty products, Google UK, October 2010
Note:
"The indexed search volumes for top search terms in cosmetics (including terms such as “mac cosmetics,” “avon,” “make up tips”) have largely followed corresponding figures for queries related women seeking men (e.g. “single men in London”, “find boyfriend”)."

There are more than 200 million active users currently accessing Facebook through their mobile devices.

"Mobile
There are more than 200 million active users currently accessing Facebook through their mobile devices.
People that use Facebook on their mobile devices are twice as active on Facebook than non-mobile users.
There are more than 200 mobile operators in 60 countries working to deploy and promote Facebook mobile products"

Source:  Official Facebook Statistics, retrieved 4th November 2010.
Earlier figures here (other figures on the Official stats, like total users, are unchanged)

The demographics of Foursquare - gender split and by-state distribution

On 2nd November 2010 Foursquare visualised checkins at polling stations in the US.
I have taken these checkins - a total of 50,416, and the gender and by-state splits to show the overall US gender and by-state split.
In summary, nearly 60% of users are male, and nearly 50% live in just 6 states - California, New York, Pennsylvania, Florida, Illinois & Texas
Note - This is clearly an extrapolation - but I believe that it's the closest we've come to seeing the real gender and geographical split of Foursquare.  It may also give an indication of how digitally advanced different states are.

Gender:
58% male, 42% female

Split by state:
California 16%

New York 13%
Pennsylvania 5%
Florida 5%
Illinois 5%
Texas 5%
Georgia 4%
Ohio 4%
Michigan 4%
Virginia 4%
Wisconsin 3%
New Jersey 3%
Minnesota 3%
North Carolina 3%
Arizona 2%
Indiana 2%
Tennessee 2%
Washington DC 1%
Connecticut 1%
Iowa 1%
South Carolina 1%
Washington 1%
Colorado 1%
Kansas 1%
Kentucky 1%
Alabama 1%
Missouri 1%
Louisiana 1%
Oklahoma 1%
Nevada 1%
Nebraska 1%
Utah 1%
Arkensas 1%
New Hampshire 0%
Rhode Island 0%
Idaho 0%
Delaware 0%
Maine 0%
New Mexico 0%
Mississippi 0%
Oregon 0%
South Dakota 0%
West Virginia 0%
Alaska 0%
Vermont 0%
North Dakota 0%
Wyoming 0%
Montana 0%
Source:  Data taken from the 'Elections' visualisation on Foursquare, 2nd November 2010, showing how many had checked in to vote in each state.
Note - To repeat - This is clearly an extrapolation - but I believe that it's the closest we've come to seeing the real gender and geographical split of Foursquare. It may also give an indication of how digitally advanced different states are.

43% of US Facebook users say they 'Like' or are fans of at least one brand on Facebook

"43% of the Facebook users surveyed said they Like, or are fans of, at least one brand on Facebook.
34% of Facebook users say they Like brands in order to stay informed about company activities.
33% say they Like brands to get updates on future products.
Among Facebook users who Like at least one brand, only 17% say they’re more likely to buy after Liking that brand on Facebook."
Source:  Research from ExactTarget and CoTweet, reported by Social Media Examiner, 29th October 2010

A combination of paid and organic search impressions leads to the greatest uplift in purchase intent

"Amongst its key findings, the study reveals that exposure to impressions of digital media boosts brand favorability. Specifically, paid search has the greatest impact on this metric, both in isolation and in combination with other digital media types. Alone, paid search impressions create the greatest lift (28%) overall. However, when combined with organic search impressions, the organic-paid search duo boosts this metric to 40 percent. Likewise, exposure to paid search impressions nets the greatest lift (35%) of individual assets for this metric in the retail vertical. Yet the paid and organic search combination creates a lift of 56 percent for the hotel sector.
The study also reveals that exposure to impressions of digital media drives Internet users' likelihood to purchase. Paid search impressions are particularly adept at influencing this behavior, whether they are used alone or in conjunction with other digital media. At the aggregate level, paid search generates a lift of 44 percent on its own; but within the retail vertical, it produces a 54 percent lift. However, combinations of two digital media types also play a role. Together, organic and paid search impressions yield the greatest lift (73%) in aggregate and in the hotel vertical (147%). But organic and display impressions create the most effective combination (64%) for this metric in the banking/financial services sector."
Source:  Research from iProspect and comScore reported in a press release from iProspect, 2nd November 2010

105,000 people have paid to access online content from The Times and Sunday Times

"More than 100,000 people have paid to go behind the Times and Sunday Times' new online paywalls but visits to their websites have fallen by about 87%.
Times Online was registering about 21 million unique users a month to its front page earlier this year but the figure fell to 2.7 million last month.
The papers said in addition 100,000 people had a joint subscription to read the newspapers in print and digitally.
Times editor James Harding said the papers were "hugely encouraged".
Publishers of the Times and Sunday Times have revealed for the first time how many people are paying to read their newspapers online or on mobiles. They said that figures stood at 105,000.
The subscription figures have been eagerly awaited by publishers and advertisers since the two papers went behind an online paywall four months ago.
The figure for unique users for their websites comprises two million for the Times and 700,000 for the Sunday Times.
[...]
The publishers now say the total paid audience so far is close to 200,000, allowing for duplications in subscriptions.
About 50,000 are paying a monthly subscription, either for the website editions or to read the papers on an iPad or Kindle. Many others are buying a £1 day pass.
The figures include subscribers to the print version of the papers who receive an online subscription as a result."
Source:  Figures revealed by News International, reported by BBC News, 2nd November 2010

Twitter has 175m registered users

"In a New York Times profile on Twitter co-founder Evan Williams, the company revealed a few interesting stats showing the growth trajectory of the network. Twitter now has 175 million registered users, which is up from 145 million users in September. That means the startup added around 30 million users in just under two months. And Twitter has added 70 million users since April.
This is impressive growth considering that Twitter had a total of 58 million users in 2009 (and 503,000 users three years ago). That’s a 200 percent increase from 2009 to 2010 in terms of users. And the year isn’t over—it’s conceivable that at the rate Twitter is growing, the company could be ringing in the New Year with 200 million users. So what’s contributing to this massive growth?"

Source:  Article in the New York Times, reported by Techcrunch, 31st October 2010

Digital accounts for nearly 25% of all radio listening in the UK

"Hopes for digital radio switchover in the next five years suffered a blow today as the growth in popularity of digital audio broadcasting (DAB) radio went into reverse.
Digital accounted for 24.8% of all radio listening in the three months to 19 September, marginally up on the 24.6% share of listening in the previous three months, according to official Rajar figures published today.
But DAB radio, the likely broadcast replacement for analogue AM and FM in the digital-only age, saw its share of listening drop, to 15.3% from 15.8% in the second quarter of 2010.
Far from listeners switching off their analogue radio sets, the popularity of AM and FM continued to grow, with a 67.6% share, up from 67% in the previous quarter and 66.1% a year ago."
Source:  Rajar report for the quarter to September 2010, reported by The Guardian, 28th October 2010

15% of US cinema screens can show 3D films

"Katzenberg brought studios and exhibitors together to craft a cost- sharing solution to pay for digital 3-D-enabled projectors. Today 15% of screens in the U.S. can show 3D movies, with 500 more added every month."
Source:  Jeffrey Katzenberg of Dreamworks, reported by CTV, 31st October 2010

3D movies account for nearly 20% of US box office revenues so far in 2010

"The movie industry welcomes Katzenberg's evangelizing because it badly needs those extra revenues. DVD sales have shrunk 19% since 2006. 3D is beginning to slowly make up for that loss, constituting nearly 20% of the $8 billion in box office revenues so far this year, up from 11% in 2009, according to Screen Digest. The production cost of a 3D movie is 10% to 20% higher than that of a regular film. But it could pay off. Jackass 3 (in 3D) earned 40% more in its opening weekend than Jackass 2."
Source:  Jeffrey Katzenberg of Dreamworks, reported by CTV, 31st October 2010

Apple is the 4th largest mobile phone vendor

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"The worldwide mobile phone market grew 14.6% in the third quarter of 2010 (3Q10), the fourth consecutive quarter of double-digit growth, driven in part by the fast-growing converged mobile device category. According to the International Data Corporation (IDC) Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker, vendors shipped 340.5 million units in 3Q10 compared to 297.1 million units in the third quarter of 2009.
The growing popularity of converged mobile devices, or smartphones, with consumers and businesspersons is evidenced by the appearance of a second smartphone-only vendor in the top 5 ranking. Apple moved into the number 4 position worldwide in 3Q10, joining Research In Motion (RIM) as one of the world's largest mobile phone suppliers. RIM has spent three quarters on IDC's leaderboard. Apple and RIM also posted the highest-growth rates among the top 5 vendors last quarter.
"The entrance of Apple to the top 5 vendor ranking underscores the increased importance of smartphones to the overall market. Moreover, the mobile phone makers that are delivering popular smartphone models are among the fastest growing firms," said Kevin Restivo, senior research analyst with IDC's Worldwide Mobile Phone Tracker. "Vendors that aren't developing a strong portfolio of smartphones will be challenged to maintain and grow market share in the future."
Apple, RIM, and the vendors producing Android-based smartphones have put noticeable pressure on Nokia, the overall market leader. "Nokia still leads all vendors by a significant margin for converged mobile devices and mobile phones as a whole," said Ramon Llamas, senior research analyst with IDC's Mobile Devices Technology and Trends team. "However, Nokia's grip on the traditional mobile phone market has been somewhat loosened, as multiple Chinese vendors have gained ground, especially within emerging markets. To bolster its overall competitiveness, Nokia has been focused on improving its smartphone offerings.""
Source:  Press release from IDC, 28th October 2010

An estimated 30m people have tried Facebook Places

"About 30 million people have tried Facebook places, a single source who works with Facebook tells us.
Reached for a response to this number, Facebook rep Larry Yu told us, "[I] don't have any guidance to offer right now, I'm afraid."
Not a denial.
Anyway, our source's number sounds reasonable to us."
Source:  Business Insider, 29th October 2010

Spotify paid out €30m in revenues to music rights holders in the first 8 months of 2010

"How much money is streaming music service Spotify generating for the music industry?
According to figures shared with Music Ally by the company, its payouts to rightsholders have topped €40 million since it launched in October 2008. That’s based on streams of songs across its seven European territories.
However, €30 million of those were paid in the first eight months of 2010, as usage of Spotify has grown sharply. That could be boiled down to €3.75 million a month, but Music Ally understands that the figure was much lower at the start of 2010, and much higher now."
Source:  Figures from Spotify, revealed to Music Ally, 28th October 2010

VidZone, Sony Playstation's music video service, has delevered more than 500 million video views

"VidZone, the free music video service for users of PlayStation, has delivered more than half a billion videos to 3.7 million fans in eighteen countries from its catalogue of 30,000 videos and recently launch 120 pre-programmed channels, serving up three billion ad impressions in the process."
Source:  Figures from VidZone, reported by CMU, 29th October 2010

iPad demographics vs. Kindle demographics (US data)

"Apple iPad users are younger and more of them are male than those of other connected devices
- 65% are male, 63% are under the age of 35
- Kindle users: 52% male, 47% under the age of 35
- Amazon Kindle users are slightly wealthier, better educated
- 28% have incomes of $100k or more, 57% have a bachelors degree or higher
- Pad users: 25% have incomes of $100k or more, 51% have a bachelors degree or higher"
Source:  The Increasingly Connected Consumer: Connected Devices, The Nielsen Company, October 2010 (pdf)

A comparison of the content accessed over the iPhone and the iPad

Click to enlarge

Source:  The Nielsen Company, 21st October 2010

The internet is worth £100 billion a year to the British economy

"The internet is worth £100bn a year to the UK economy, a study has concluded.

The research, which was commissioned by Google, found that the internet accounts for 7.2% of the UK's gross domestic product (GDP).

If the internet was an economic sector it would be the UK's fifth largest, said the report from the Boston Consulting Group (BCG).

This would make the sector larger than the construction, transport and utilities industries.

Some 60% of the £100bn a year figure is made up from internet consumption - the amount that users spend on online shopping and on the cost of their connections and devices to access the web.

The rest comes from investment in the UK's internet infrastructure, government IT spending and net exports."

Source: Research commissioned by Google, and reported by BBC News, 28th October 2010
Full report here
Report website here

UK mobile network 3 carries more than 100 terabytes of data each day

"Three’s network now carries more than 100 terabytes of data a day across it – or roughly 20-times the amount of information held in Wikipedia. Of this more than 40% is made up of people streaming media from sites like BBC iPlayer and Youtube, 38% is from web browsing, including web downloads, and close to 6% is from people updating Microsoft software. In addition about 2.5% is now made up of people messaging each other, such as via Skype or MSN."

Source: Press release from Three Mobile, 14th October 2010

The Xbox 360 outsold every other gaming console in the US in Q3 2010

"Microsoft Corp. today announced record first-quarter revenue of $16.20 billion for the quarter ended Sept. 30, 2010, a 25% increase from the same period of the prior year. Operating income, net income and diluted earnings per share for the quarter were $7.12 billion, $5.41 billion and $0.62 per share, which represented increases of 59%, 51% and 55%, respectively, when compared with the prior year period.
[...]
During the quarter, Microsoft saw year-over-year growth across all business segments. Among the highlights are these:
- Office 2010 is off to a fast start with revenue growing over 15% in its first full quarter in market.
- Microsoft continues to see a healthy and sustaining business PC refresh cycle.
- Xbox 360 consoles grew 38%, outselling every competing console in the U.S. for each of the past four months.
- For yet another quarter, Bing continued to grow market share, while achieving major milestones in implementing Microsoft’s partnership with Yahoo."
Source:  Press Release from Microsoft, 28th October 2010

Kindle versions of books are outselling print editions (hardback and paperback) for the top 1000 best sellers on Amazon in the US

"Kindle book unit sales continue to overtake print on Amazon.com, even while print book sales continue to grow. During the past 30 days, Amazon.com customers purchased more Kindle books than print books--hardcover and paperback combined--for the top 10, 25, 100, and 1,000 bestselling books on Amazon.com.
"For the top 10 bestselling books on Amazon.com, customers are choosing Kindle books over hardcover and paperback books combined at a rate of greater than 2 to 1. Kindle books are also outselling print books for the top 25, 100, and 1,000 bestsellers--it's across the board," said Kessel. "This is remarkable when you consider that we've been selling hardcover and paperback books for 15 years, and Kindle books for just 36 months."
Other recent milestones for Kindle include:
- In the 12 weeks following the introduction of the new generation Kindles, Kindle devices or Kindle-related items such as Kindle books and covers represented 15 of the top 15 bestselling items on Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk combined.
- Amazon sold more than 3 times as many Kindle books in the first nine months of 2010 as in the first nine months of 2009.
- The Association of American Publishers' latest data reports that e-book sales grew 193 percent between January and August 2010. Kindle book sales growth during the same period exceeded this rate."

Source:  Press release from Amazon, 25th October 2010

Posts made on Facebook at 3pm on a Wednesday are the most likely to generate reactions

"A new report from Vitrue has analyzed data on Facebook to determine when is the best time of day to make a post. After studying more than 1.6 million posts, 7.56 million comments and 1,500 brand streams, it boils down to this: Wednesday at 3PM ET.
It is, Vitrue, said the consistently busiest period. In general, it found that  the best usage period were 11 AM, 3 PM and 8 PM ET."
Source:  Research from Vitrue, reported by MarketingVox, 28th October 2010

Google represents an average 6.4% of all Internet traffic around the world

"Google now represents an average 6.4% of all Internet traffic around the world. This number grows even larger (to as much as 8-12%) if I include estimates of traffic offloaded by the increasingly common Google Global Cache (GGC) deployments and error in our data due to the extremely high degree of Google edge peering with consumer networks. Keep in mind that these numbers represent increased market share — Google is growing considerably faster than overall Internet volumes which are already increasing 40-45% each year. More data on general Internet growth trends is available in some of our earlier papers and blog posts.
While its not news that Google is Big, what is amazing is how much bigger Google continues to get.
A quick analysis of the data also shows Google now has direct peering (i.e. not transit) with more than 70% of all providers around the world (an increase of 5-10% from last year). In fact, the only remaining major group of ISPs without direct Google peering are several of the tier1s and national PTTs — many of whom will not settlement-free peer with Google due to regulatory prohibitions or commercial strategy."
Source:  Arbor Networks, 25th October 2010

The Top 25 brand sites on Facebook, by the number of 'Likes'

"1. Starbucks (16,032,409)
2. Coca Cola (15,095,389)
3. Oreo (12,085,126)
4. Skittles (11,508,441)
5. Red Bull (10,198,875)
6. Victoria’s Secret (8,429,334)
7. Disney (8,394,141)
8. Converse All Star (7,366,892)
9. iTunes (7,071,721)
10. MTV (7,043,056)
11. Zara (6,063,583)
12. Pringles (5,762,518)
13. NBA (5,616,388)
14. Starburst (5,380,056)
15. Nutella (5,208,281)
16. Dr Pepper (5,164,646)
17. Monster Energy (4,916,536)
18. Adidas Originals (4,804,224)
19. H&M (4,520,070)
20. Ferrero Rocher (4,424,751)
21. McDonalds (3,795,486)
22. Playstation (3,683,751)
23. Xbox (3,447,690)
24. Taco Bell (3,399,860)
25. Puma (2,712,075)"
Source:  Compiled by TNW Social Media, 25th October 2010

The Top 30 British brands on twitter by number of followers

"1. Topshop @Topshop_Tweets (99,852 followers)
2. Burberry @burberry (64,128)
3. ASOS  @ASOS (56,838)
4. Comparethemeerkat.com with Aleksandr Orlov (Comparethemarket.com) @Aleksandr_Orlov (41,356)
5. O2 @O2 (31,270)
6. Innocent Drinks @innocentdrinks (30,952)
7. British Airways @British_Airways (24,374)
8. Virgin Atlantic @VirginAtlantic (18,050)
9. Selfridges @Selfridges (17,752)
10. Vodafone  @vodafoneuk (16,842)
11. Nando’s @Nandos_Official (15,732)
12. Heathrow Airport @heathrowairport (14,971)
13. Virgin Media @VirginMedia (14,422)
14. New Look @NewLookFashion (13,040)
15. Westfield London @westfieldlondon (11,404)
16. Lovefilm.com @lovefilm (11,217)
17. Dell Small Business News @DellSMBnews (10,699)
18. Topman @topmanuk (9,299)
19. Samsung @samsungukmobile (8,698)
20. Asda @asda (8,114)
21. H&M @hmunitedkingdom (7,688)
22. Harvey Nichols @harvey_nichols (7,461)
23. T Mobile @tmobileofficial (6,687)
24. Cath Kidston @cath_kidston (6,393)
25. Skittles @skittles (6,168)
26. Honda @honda_uk (5,570)
27. Sony Ericsson @sonyericssonuk (5,259)
28. Dorothy Perkins @dorothy_perkins (4,948)
29. Sage @sageuk (4,717)
30. Waitrose @waitroseuk (4,538)
Source:  compiled by Sutro Digital, 25th October 2010
[Note - these are global followers of companies with either a mainly British presence, British branches of global companies, or thought of as British]
See their site for any corrections and updates!