Here's Your OBT:
WORLD'S LARGEST WORLDWIDE WEB USER SURVEY RELEASED
PART 1
Home Page Press and OBT wish to thank Georgia Tech Research
Corporation (GTRC) for providing permission to publish its copyrighted
findings. URL and details to contact GTRC will be found at the end
of this report.
Georgia Tech University has released its Fifth WWW User survey.
This is the largest study of Internet activity in the world with over
11,700 unique responses. For all questions, analysis between the
following groups were performed: European vs US users, Female vs
Male users, and by age (19-25, 26-50, 51+). This newest survey has
been expanded again to include more issues central to the expansion
of the Internet including politics, data privacy and Java programming.
Quick summary
The average age of an Interneter is 33 years old. Women have increased
their participation to 31.5 percent. The estimated average household
income has dropped slightly but remains high at $59,000 in US dollars.
US respondents represented 73.4 percent of total respondents; Europe
was the next largest category with 10.8 percent. More than half of the
respondents access the Web primarily from home and are paying for
their own access.
Over 80 percent of respondents access the Web on a daily basis,
and most use it simply for browsing and entertainment purposes.
More than a third (36 percent) surf the Web instead of watching TV
at least once a day.
Higher education is an Internet hallmark with 56.5 percent having one
or more college degrees. English is the native/first language for 88.6
percent of users; 96.1 percent in the US but interestingly 43.3 percent
for Europeans. More than 96 percent have a color monitor. The Web
is 87.3 percent caucasian/white.
In terms of politics, the largest category of Web users classify
themselves as "moderate" (30.1 percent). For US respondents,
25.4 percent identify themselves as democrats and 21.1 percent as
republicans. The next two largest categories were "independent,
leaning toward democrat" with 16.4 percent and "independent,
leaning toward republican" with 10.3 percent. Web users show a
strong interest in political issues: 92 percent are registered to vote
and 60 percent participated in the most recent elections in their
respective countries. Over 40 percent report they are more involved
with political issues since going online. These numbers suggest the
Web (and Internet) can potentially play a significant role in politics.
As the Web and Internet become a part of daily life for many people,
data privacy issues become increasingly important. One question
asked examines the conditions under which users are willing to reveal
demographic information. The condition that most respondents agreed
to was "if a statement was provided regarding how the information
would be used" ("use", 78.5 percent). This number, along with others
in this category, suggests respondents are more concerned with their
right to control demographic information than any compensation they
might receive for revealing it. Only 5.9 percent reported they would
not give a site demographic information under any conditions. Also,
most recognized that Web designers have a legitimate need to collect
demographic information, but they strongly objected to the idea that this
information could be resold to other companies.
Java is a programming language developed at Sun Microsystems
which can be used to add interactivity to Web pages. GVU asked
respondents who have authored Web pages some of their opinions
on Java. Only 17.3 percent of respondents who identify themselves
as Web authors have programmed in Java. More than half of Web
authors plan to use Java in the next year (58.1 percent). They
identified "platform independence" as the a primary advantage of
Java. The largest category of authors see Java as somewhat
secure (46.9 percent).
An equal amount think Java is very insecure or somewhat insecure.
Finally, more than half of the authors responding see Java's value as
mainly functional (54.9 percent). Almost 30 percent feel it is mainly
aesthetic or adds no value at all. The remaining 15 percent think it
represents a revolution that will fundamentally change the Web.
Demographics
What is the average age?
The average age of all the Web users that responded to the Fifth
Survey is 33.0 years old. One of the reoccurring differences
between European and US users is age profiles, with the European
users (average age 28.8) being younger than their US counterparts
(average age 33.9). As with the Fourth Survey, there are few major
differences between the age profiles for men and women.
The average age for women is 31.9 years old which is slightly
younger than the men at 33.4 years old. These numbers are almost
identical to the Fourth Survey where the average ages were 31.8
years old for women and 33.1 years old for men. A trend observed
in the Fourth Survey that continues in the Fifth Survey is for the
women to have a stronger presence within the 11-20 year old range,
with 12.9 percent of the women belonging to the 16-20 year old
category compared to 10.1 percent of the men. The stronger presence
of younger women is supported by the occupational data which also
shows a strong presence of women college students.
What is the gender ratio and how has this changed over time?
Overall, 31.5 percent of the users are female and 68.5 percent are
male. This represents a moderate increase in female and quite a
significant jump from the Third Survey (April 1995), where 15.5
percent reported being female.
The US segment continues to be integrating more female users into
its user base than other countries with 34.4 percent of the users
being female in the US (65.6 percent male). Europe reports only
15.2 percent females. However, this is a 45 percent increase from
the Fourth Survey, where 10.5 percent of the European users
were female.
What is the average and median income?
The estimated average household income for the Fifth Survey is
$59,000 US dollars. The average income for the Fifth Survey is
slightly lower than the Fourth Survey ($63,000) and much lower
than the Third Survey ($69,000).
As with previous surveys, the European users have more users in
the lower income brackets (23.0 percent under $20k) and fewer
above $50k (31.3 percent). This trend is due to the strong presence
of students in the European Web user community. The 19-25 year
old age group reports having less income than the older age groups
(29.4 percent under $20k). For the 26-50 year old age group, 48.4
percent report a household income above $50k, with 61.5 percent
over $50k for the over 50 year old age group.
What about location, marital status and occupations?
For classification of location by major geographical location, 73.4
percent of the respondents were from the US, 10.8 percent from
Europe and 8.4 percent from Canada & Mexico. Compared to the
Third Survey which was run one year ago (80.6 percent from the
US, 9.8 percent from Europe, and 5.8 percent from Canada &
Mexico) this represents a significant shift towards less of a US
dominance in Web users. Additionally, notable increases occurred
in most of the other geographical areas like Asia, Africa, Oceania,
the Middle East, and Central & South America. Responses were
received from all the continents.
The vast majority of older users are located in the US (83.4 percent),
more so than the other age groups (74.9 percent 26-50 year old
and 67.1 percent 19-25 year old). Besides the US, the largest
concentration of younger users (19-25 year old) is in Europe (16.6 percent).
One of the more stable characteristics of Web users over the
survey is marital status. Overall, 41.1 percent of users are married,
with 40.8 percent being single. Users living with another was 9.6
percent and those divorced was 5.1 percent. Europeans were twice
as likely to report living with another person (18.4 percent) compared
to the US (8.0 percent). These percentages are almost exactly the
same as in the Fourth Survey.
As with the Third and Fourth Survey, women Web users are less
likely to be married than men (38.2 percent verses 42.5 percent)
and more likely to be divorced (7.0 percent verses (4.2 percent) or
living with another person (10.8 percent verses 9.1 percent). Three
quarters of the 19-25 year olds are single, with three quarters of the
50+ year olds being married. The 26-50 year olds are more likely to
be married than single (54.0 percent vs 25.6 percent).
As with the Fourth Survey, Educational occupations account for 29.6
percent of the Web users, with Computer related occupations a close
second at 27.8 percent. This is significant shift from the Third Survey a
year ago where Computer related occupations accounted for 31.4
percent of the users and Educational occupations accounted for 23.7
percent. Thus, there appears to be a solid migration of non-computer
science users, with a strong inflow from the educational sector.
Professional and management occupations account for 18.9 percent
and 10.7 percent respectively.
Female users tend to be primarily involved in Educational occupations
(35.5 percent), with Professional (19.8 percent) and Computer related
(18.2 percent) occupations following. This is quite a different
occupational profile than males and is supported by the educational
attainment and age profiles of females. Male users are slightly more
likely to be in Computer occupations related (32.2 percent) than
Educational (26.8 percent), with Professional (18.5 percent) and
Management (11.5 percent) following.
The browser
Primary use of the WWW browser
Respondents were allowed to mark more than one answer. The most
common Web activity is simply browsing (78.7 percent) followed by
entertainment (64.5 percent) and work (50.9 percent). A notable
change is shopping which went from 11.1 percent in the Fourth
Survey to 14.2 percent in the Fifth.
Europeans tend to report less recreational uses of the Web than do
US users. Males reported slightly more work-related uses of the
Web: work (54.1 percent) and business research 43.3 percent)
while females reported more educational uses (56.5 percent).
The 26-50 age group reported significant more work (59.6 percent)
and business research (47.1 percent) being done on the Web
than other age groups. Those aged 19-25 reported more
entertainment uses (76.5 percent) and academic research (48.8 percent).
Nearly 42 percent spend under five hours per week doing fun
computing; 27.6 percent spend 6-10 hours per week and 28.9
percent spend 11-50 hours per week. About half of European
users (49.7 percent) claim to use their computers for fun 1-5 hours
per week compared with 35.8 percent of US users. Twice as many
US users claim to use their computers for fun 21-30 hours per week
(8.1 percent US, 3.5 percent Europe).
Number of hours browser used per week
The largest category of users spends 10-20 hours per week using
their browsers (27.8 percent). The next largest category spends
4-6 hours (19.3 percent). Now 63.8 percent of users spend more
than seven hours per week browsing. Europeans spend less time
than Americans. Females spend less time than males, e.g. 36.2
percent of females spend over 10 hours per week compared to 51
percent of males. More respondents in the 26-50 age range spend
7-20 hours per week on the Web than any other group. Younger
users, however, are the largest category spending over 21 hours
per week (20 percent).
Browsing strategies
For this question users were asked what strategies they use when
browsing the Web: Hotlist (users visiting pages they have added to
their Hotlist), Index (using search engines such as Lycos), Meta-index
(using large search engines such as Yahoo!), Opportunistic (following
links from page to page as they are encountered), and URL (typing in
known URLs).
As in the Fourth Survey, the highest was Hotlist at 84.7 percent but
the lowest changed from typing URLs to using Meta-indices, 61.5
percent. The percentages for Hotlist, URL and Index have risen while
percentages for Meta-indices and opportunistic strategies have dropped.
Females reported a higher use of opportunistic searching than did
males (78 percent female, 67.7 percent male). Older responders reported
relying on their Hotlist more than younger users.
Number of items Hotlisted/bookmarked
The largest category of users has 11-50 items in their Hotlist
(39.2 percent) and 77.1 percent have over 11 items. The percentage
of people with over 100 items in their Hotlist increased five
percentage points since the Fourth Survey to 18.6 percent.
More European responders than US had over 100 items
(25.3 percent Europe, 18.6 percent US). The responders with the
highest number of items in their Hotlist are users in the 26-50 age
range; 42.7 percent have over 51 items in their Hotlist.
How often do people use their Web browser?
For this question, GVU means how many times one uses the Web
for a specific set of tasks or activities. This does not mean how
many times the browser is launched per day. It was learned 43.6
percent of respondents use the Web 1 to 4 times a day, 37.9
percent use it more frequently and 18.5 percent use it less
frequently. Compared to the Fourth Survey, this indicates a slight
rise in the percentage of respondents using the Web on a daily basis.
Fewer females use their browsers on a daily basis: 72.2 percent
of females compared to 86.6 percent of males. Both of these
percentages, however, are higher than in the Fourth Survey.
These numbers are very good news for Web sites that provide
content that changes daily.
How users find out about pages
Nearly all respondents (90.7 percent) find out about Web pages
from other Web pages. Next most popular is search engines at
83.1 percent. Other popular sources are magazines (64.7 percent),
friends (58.5 percent) Usenet (44.4 percent) and newspapers
(39.3 percent).
The most noticeable differences between US and European
responders are in finding out about Web pages via TV (38.2
percent US, 19.8 percent Europe) and Usenet (45.7 percent US,
55.6 percent Europe). A smaller percentage of females find out
about Web pages from Usenet than do males (32.6 percent female,
52.1 percent male). Older responders are more likely to find out
about Web pages through traditional media: magazines 71.6 percent,
newspapers 56.7 percent, TV 37.8 percent and books 31.8 percent.
Frequently visited sites
Frequent search engine use was reported by 65.6 percent. In
comparison, the most frequently visited sites were online
newspapers (37.9 percent), CNN (35.9 percent) and "other" at
26.0 percent. A higher percentage of males reported using search
engines (74.5 percent), online news (41.3 percent), and CNN
(39 percent) frequently.
Reasons for saving and printing WWW pages
The most common reason for saving documents is to use them
off-line (63.3 percent) followed by reading them off-line
(52.7 percent) and distributing them to other (48.2 percent).
There are no noticeable differences between genders. Older users
were more likely to save documents to use them off-line, read
them off-line and distribute them to others. Younger users were
more likely to save them to use the content, to copy the format or
because they were afraid they would disappear.
Frequency data
Hours per week of "work" computing
Only 25.1 percent spend less than five hours of computing time
per week on work while 18.5 percent spend over 41 hours.
European responders spend more hours per week working with
computers than do US respondents: 56.4 percent of Europeans
spend more than 21 hours per week compared to 44.8 percent
of Americans.
Females generally spend less time using their computers for
work than males. Twice as many males spend over 50 hours per
week than females (10.1 percent male, 4.7 percent female).
Users in the 26-50 age range rely on computers for work much
more than the other age ranges. Nearly 40% of the 26-50 group
use computers for work more than 30 hours per week.
Frequency of economic information use
Over a third (38 percent) reported they never use the Web to
find economic information and 24.8 percent have used it for this
purpose "a few times." A higher percentage of Europeans
(46.6 percent) reported never having used it for this purpose.
Frequency of newsgroup use
Close to half of respondents (47.8 percent) reported they have
never accessed newsgroups or only accessed them a few times.
Of those who access them on a regular basis, the largest category
use them several times a week (14 percent). More females than
males have accessed newsgroups only a few times (31.4 percent
female, 25.5 percent male) but approximately the same percentage
of males and females have never accessed them (21 percent).
Older responders tend to access newsgroups more frequently
than younger responders; 22.8 percent access them at least
once a day.
Frequency of online shopping
This question relates to actually making purchases over the Web.
Nearly half 46.4 percent have never used the Web for online
shopping, but 33.5 percent have used it a few times. An even
higher percentage of users in Europe have never used the Web
for shopping (58.8 percent) but increasingly they have the highest
percentage of users who use the Web to shop on a daily basis
(7.6 percent).
Responders in the 19-25 age range are least likely to have used
the Web for shopping at least once (53 percent never have)
compared to approximately 41 percent who never have in the
other age categories.
Frequency of product information use
Product information is one of the most popular types of information
accessed. Only 7.6 percent have never accessed product
information on the Web; 30.1% access it on a weekly basis and
26.3 percent on a monthly basis. Males access product information
more frequently than females at 34.6 percent weekly compared to
females at 20 percent. Twice as many females as the survey
average (15.2 percent) have never accessed product information.
There are no clear trends for product information access with
respect to age.
Frequency of reference information use
Reference information is the most frequently accessed category
the GVU study inquired about. Daily use was reported by 17.5
percent of responders and 33.8 percent weekly. Only 3.3 percent
have never accessed information on the Web.
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Subject: Part 2 / World's Largest WWW Survey
MORE from OBT:
WORLD'S LARGEST WORLDWIDE WEB USER SURVEY RELEASED
PART 2
Home Page Press and OBT wish to thank Georgia Tech Research
Corporation (GTRC) for providing permission to publish its copyrighted
findings. URL and details to contact GTRC will be found at the end
of this report.
Internet access
Online services subscribed to
Overall, 51.6 percent of users do not subscribe to an online service.
The largest categories for users who subscribe are "other" 24.7
percent, America Online 16.6 percent and CompuServe 11 percent.
An even higher percentage of Europeans users do not subscribe
to any online service (59.2 percent) or to services not listed in the
question (26.9 percent). Of those listed the largest categories for
European users were CompuServe 14.4 percent and Microsoft
Network 3.0 percent. For the services listed, the largest categories
for US users were America Online (22 percent), CompuServe 11.1
percent, NetCom 6.5 percent and Microsoft Network 4.1 percent.
Respondents over age 50 were the most likely to subscribe to an
online service.
How fast are people's connection to the Internet?
The most common connection speed is 28.8 Kb/sec (39.0 percent)
followed by 14.4 Kb/sec (25.5 percent). This is the reverse of the
Fourth Survey, where 14.4 Kb/sec connections were the most
common. The number of respondents connecting at speeds less
than or equal to 28.8 Kb/sec has grown slightly since the Fourth
Survey from 61 percent to 65.5 percent. So while respondents
have faster modems than in previous surveys, more respondents
are using modems than in previous surveys. European respondents,
in general, have faster connection speeds. A higher percentage
of respondents over age 50 are connecting with speeds under 28.8
Kb/sec (87.5 percent).
What are the main problems with using the Web?
For this question, users were asked which of the following problems
they encountered when using the Web: not being able to find a
page I know is out there ("find info"), not being able to determine
where I am ("lost in h-text"), not being able to organize well the
pages and information I gather ("organize"), not being able to find a
page I once visited ("return"), it takes too long to view/download pages
("speed"), not being able to visualize where I have been and where
I can go ("visualize"), and it costs too much ("cost"). Users were
allowed to mark more than one answer.
The most common problems are speed (80.9 percent), organizing
retrieved data (33.6 percent), finding information (32.4 percent).
Speed is even more of a problem than in the Fourth Survey
(69.1 percent) even though respondents are reporting higher modem
speeds. The least reported problems are getting lost in hypertext
(5.4 percent) and cost (9.2 percent). However, twice as many
Europeans reported cost a problem as Americans.
The only noticeable difference between genders was the
problem of finding information: 28.8 percent of males and 40
percent of females reported this problem. More younger users
than older reported finding and organizing information and
returning to previously visited sites to be a problem.
Where do people access the Web from?
This was a new question for this survey. Respondents were
asked to indicate the primary place from which they access the
WWW. Only one answer could be selected. "Distributed"
means that they do not have a primary place--their access is
distributed. More than half of the respondents said their
primary place of access was at home (55.4 percent). This
number corresponds well with similar questions, such as
Who Pays for Your Access where over half of respondents
indicate that they pay for their own access. More European
users than US users consider work to be their primary place
of access (46.3 percent vs. 32.2 percent). More than 73 percent
of those over 50 reported that their primary place of access is
at home.
How willing are users to pay for access to Web sites?
This question has changed since the last survey, so a strict
comparison of answers is probably not fair. In previous surveys,
GVU asked if respondents willingness to pay depended on the
cost and/or quality of the information provided. This time, GVU
presented several different payment schemes to find out what
schemes users preferred. With each survey, the percentage of
respondents who have stated outright they would not pay for
access to WWW pages has been increasing.
For the Fifth Survey, 65 percent said that they would not pay.
This may reflect the fact that most people primarily use the Web
as a source of entertainment and not necessarily a resource they
are willing to pay for. Another reason might be the fact that so
many users are now paying Internet service providers for Web
access. They may not be willing to pay twice: once for access
to the Web in general and again for specific Web pages.
For respondents who would agree to pay fees for Web pages,
the most popular models were a subscription model
(12.1 percent) and pay-per-view (10.9 percent). For those
willing to pay, the subscription model was favored by the
youngest users (13.0 percent), while older users preferred a
pay-per-view model (13.7 percent).
As was found in the Fourth Survey, the most common problems
are: speed (80.9 percent), organizing retrieved information
(33.6 percent), and finding information (32.4 percent). Speed is
even more of a problem than in the last survey
(69.1 percent fourth), even though respondents are reporting
higher modem speeds. The least reported problems are: getting
lost in hypertext (5.4 percent) and the cost (9.2 percent).
Intend to spend on content next year
Exactly half of all respondents don't plan to spend anything on
Internet content next year. Another 28.4 percent plan to spend
less than $100 US. A higher percentage of younger users
(62.7 percent) aged 19-25 don't plan to spend anything on
content next year. Older users plan to spend more. Very few
users plan to spend over $500 US.
TV versus the Internet
How often do people use the Web instead of watching TV?
This question was refined from the Fourth Survey to allow
GVU to get more detailed information about the relationship
between Web use and TV watching.
Almost 36 percent of respondents claim they use the Web
instead of watching TV on a daily basis. An additional 28.9
percent say the Web replaces TV on a weekly basis, usually
more than once a week. Older users are more inclined to use
the Web instead of watching TV. For those over 50, 74.3
percent report using it at least several times a week compared
to 60.0 percent of those aged 26-50 and 57.4 percent of
those aged 19-25.
Frequency of surfing the WWW instead of watching TV
Almost 36 percent claim they use the Web instead of watching TV
on a daily basis. An additional 28.9 percent say the Web
replaces TV on a weekly basis, usually more than once a week.
Responders from Europe are far less likely to use the Web instead
of watching TV; 25.8 percent say they have never used the Web
instead of TV.
Older users are more inclined to use the Web instead of TV.
For those over 50, 74.3 percent report using it at least several
times a week compared to 60 percent of those aged 26-50 and
57.4 percent of those aged 19-25.
Technology
Intent to spend on hardware and software next year
Responders reported a wide range of hardware and software
spending expectations for next year. Exactly 28 percent expect
to spend $101-500 US while 24.7 percent plan to spend
$1000-4999 US. The remaining responders are almost equally
likely to spend more, less or between these amounts.
Only 11 percent plan to spend nothing on hardware and
software next year. Europeans are more likely to spend nothing
or over $1000 US than are Americans. Females in general plan
to spend less. Younger responders are more likely to spend less.
Those aged 26-50 are most likely to spend over $1000 US.
Technologies used for communication
Email is used by respondents just as much as the telephone
(98.1 percent email, 97.6 percent telephone). Least used
technologies are wireless phone (44.3 percent) and pages
(32.5 percent). More than twice as many US responders use
voice mail as Europeans.
Intranets utilized within organization
About half of all respondents reported that their organizations
do not use Intranets and 16 percent weren't sure. Intranets are
more prevalent in Europe at 42.2 percent of responders. More
than twice as many females as males don't know if their
organization is using an intranet.
Data Privacy
GVU predicts that issues of data privacy will become increasingly
important as the Internet becomes a part of many people's daily
lives. This new questionnaire provides the first insights into
users' knowledge of and concerns about data privacy issues.
Do users know what information can be automatically recorded
during a Web transaction?
Most users are aware the time of the request (85.1 percent) as
well as the name of the requested page (82.7 percent) are
loggable. Following in order of response rates, the name of the
user's machine (71.0 percent), the name of the user's browser
(59.0 percent), the user's email address (45.2 percent), the
user's operating system name (37.9 percent), a site ID the
persists across sessions (aka cookies) (37.7 percent), and
finally the user's physical location (31.7 percent). Only 14.7
percent reported not knowing what information is loggable.
This question reveals that while the majority of users understand
the basic information that can be recorded per transaction, many
do not know some of the advanced features like cookies.
Additionally, the current HTTP specifications do not enable the
user's email address to be logged, thus indicating that 45.2 percent
of the users hold a false belief about what is loggable. Yet, given
the recent implementation bugs (enabled the user's email address
to be sent to whomever) of certain browsers that implement
scriptable languages like Javascript, these results may be a
bit ambiguous.
What are some of their opinions on various data privacy issues?
For this question users were asked to rate their level of
agreement with various statements about data privacy issues.
There were five choices, ranging from Agree Strongly (5) to
Disagree Strongly (1). The statement that respondents agreed
most strongly with (4.6/5.0) was: "I value being able to visit sites
on the Internet in an anonymous manner." A close second at 4.4
was: "A user ought to have complete control over which sites
get what demographic information." The desire to control their
own information is also seen in the conditions under which
users are willing to reveal that information.
Continuing to emphasize the importance of control, many
respondents agreed that they "ought to be able to take on
different aliases/roles at different times on the Internet" (3.7).
However they strongly disagreed with the idea that "content
providers have the right to resell information about its users to
other companies" (1.7). Most users, however, recognize that
Web site designers have a legitimate need to collect
demographic information in order to better design their Web
sites (3.8) and to market their sites to advertisers (3.8). Most
also recognize a role for advertising-supported content (4.0).
What are the conditions under which users are willing to reveal
their demographic information?
The condition that most respondents agreed to was "if a
statement was provided regarding how the information would
be used" ("use", 78.5 percent). The other statement that more
than half of the users agreed with was "if a statement was
provided regarding what information was being collected"
("notice", 59.1 percent). This second statement refers mainly
to information that can be collected automatically during a
Web transaction, such as browser type and machine name.
Other conditions that respondents were somewhat less
agreeable to were: "for some value added service
(e.g. notification of events)" ("value", 44.4 percent) and "in
exchange for access to the pages on the Web site"
("exchange", 46.7 percent).
Interestingly, this suggests respondents are more concerned
with their right to control demographic information than any
compensation they might receive for revealing it. Only 5.9
percent reported that they would not give a site demographic
information under any condition. Slightly more than a quarter
(26.2%) reported providing false demographic information
when registering at Web sites and 11.1% have never
registered at a site.
Politics
This was a new questionnaire for the Fifth survey which
investigated the political profile of Web users as well as their
online political activities.
What is the political profile of Web users?
Overall, the largest category of respondents considered
themselves moderate in their political views (30.1 percent),
21.1 percent considered themselves to be conservative or
very conservative, while 35.18 percent were liberal or very
liberal. For US respondents, the curve peaked at moderate
(32.5 percent) with 4.4 percent in the conservative extreme
and 8.9 percent in the liberal extreme. In Europe, however,
the curve peaked at liberal (33.6 percent) with only 0.7 percent
in the conservative extreme, but 17.1 percent in the liberal
extreme. One thing to consider with these numbers, however,
is that the terms "liberal" and "conservative" may have slightly
different meanings in different cultures, so a strict
comparison between the US and Europe may not be
appropriate. More females than males reported being liberal
or very liberal (40.6 percent female, 32.7 percent male).
About the same number, however, reported being moderate.
For respondents in the US, GVU asked what party they
identified most strongly with. The largest category was
"democrat" with 25.4 percent closely followed by "republican"
with 21.1 percent. The next two largest categories were
"independent, leaning toward democrat" with 16.4 percent
and "independent, leaning toward republican" with 10.3 percent.
Only 7.4 percent of respondents classified themselves as
strict independents and 5.8 percent classified themselves as
libertarians. It is interesting to note that although most people
identify with one of the major parties, most also classify
themselves as "moderates." Respondents over age 50, in
general, identify more strongly with their party of choice than
do other age groups; 42.9 percent classified themselves as
clearly democrat or republican.
What are their voting behaviors?
An extremely high percentage of respondents are currently
registered to vote (91.9 percent). This is not surprising given the
high levels of education and income also reported by survey
respondents. Approximately 60 percent of all respondents report
having participated in the most recent local, legislative, and
national elections. In the US, the highest participation rate is in
national elections (72.5 percent) while in Europe, the highest rate
is in local elections (59.1 percent). Across all voting categories,
the participation rate increased dramatically with age. The age
19-25 respondents averaged 45.8 percent participation, 26-50
averaged 69.6 percent, and over 50 averaged 81.6 percent.
What other political activities do people engage in?
Overall, 40.3 percent of respondents reported they are more
involved with political issues since coming online and 48.36
percent reported being equally involved. Over 52.2 percent of
respondents report engaging in some "other" online political
activity that does not fall into any of the given categories. For
the categories given, the most popular online activities were:
writing a government official (31.0 percent), discussing political
issues (23.3 percent), and signing petitions (22.1 percent). The
majority of respondents have never sent email to their highest
government official (73.1 percent) while 17.7 percent have sent
1 or 2 email messages. Only 2.5 percent reported they cannot
send email to their highest official. The percentage of respondents
aged 19-25 who take part in online petitions is more than double
the percentage of those over age 50 (30.4 percent and 13.6
percent respectively).
The most popular off-line political activities were: discussing
political issues ("debate",68.4 percent), signing a petition
(46.8 percent), and writing/calling government officials
(34.9 percent). The least popular were: joining a political
group (9.9 percent), volunteering for a party/candidate
(10.9 percent), and attending a rally (17.1 percent). More
than half of respondents over 50 have written or called a
government official in the last year (52.6 percent) compared
to 22.4 percent of those aged 19-25. More than a quarter
(27.2 percent) have contributed or solicited money compared
to only 16.9 percent of those aged 26-50 and 6.9 percent
of those aged 19-25.
Web authors and Java
This is a new section for the Fifth Survey that asks Web authors
about their uses and perceptions of Java, a programming
language still being developed at Sun Microsystems which can
be used to add interactivity to Web pages.
Have you used Java and do you plan to use it in the future?
Only 17.3 percent of respondents who identify themselves as
Web authors have programmed in Java. But, more than half of
Web authors plan to use Java in the next year (58.1 percent).
Just over a quarter are not sure (26.4 percent).
What are the major advantages of Java?
This question asked Web authors what they thought the major
advantages of Java were. Respondents could choose more
than one answer. The most cited advantage was Java's platform
independence which was noted by 46.7 percent of respondents.
The next largest category was "Other/Do not Know" with 42.64
percent. About a quarter of respondents identified the fact that
Java doesn't require special permissions (unlike CGI
programming) (24.9 percent) and better interactivity (23.5 percent)
as major advantages. Only 11.5 percent of users cited built-in
security measures as an advantage of Java programming.
What are authors' perceptions and knowledge of Java's security?
For this question, authors were asked to rate their knowledge
of Java's security measures as: "None at all", "A little (e.g. could
list some of them)", "Moderate (e.g. have read the white paper)",
"A lot (e.g. have a thorough understanding of flaws recently
found)", or "Expert (e.g. have written code to test them) ". Of
those who knew something about Java's security, more than
half of the respondents reported that they know "a little"
(53.9 percent). 45.0 percent reported knowing a "moderate"
amount or "a lot". Only 1.0 percent considered themselves experts.
The largest category of authors see Java as somewhat
secure (46.9 percent). An equal amount think Java is very
insecure or somewhat insecure.
What is the real value of Java to the Web?
More than half of the authors responding see Java's value as
mainly functional (54.9 percent). Almost 30 percent feel it is
mainly aesthetic or adds no value at all. The remaining 15 percent
think it represents a revolution that will fundamentally change the Web.
OBT IMPORTANT NOTE: The above data is copyrighted by
Georgia Tech Research Corporation (GTRC) 1995/1996.
All rights reserved. Source: GVU's Fifth WWW User Survey
URL http://www.cc.gatech.edu/gvu/user_surveys/. The above
results may not be re-printed for commercial usage. To license
the results, contact Kathleen Maher, GTRC Corporation,
400 10th Street, Atlanta, GA 30332,
(404) 894-6900 VOICE or (404) 894-9728 FAX.
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