drinking from puddles

Some tidbits: - The PC is a regularly used, indispensable household appliance to one in three adults. On a typical day 24 million Americans use a home computer for some personal or work-related task. - Among those who currently use their modems, the study detected a decided softness in attitudes toward online activities and a fragile pattern of use. Only 32% of those who go online say they would miss it “a lot” if no longer available. This compares to nearly twice as many computer users (63%), newspaper readers (58%) and cable TV subscribers (54%) who would say the same about these services. The frequency of online activity is also modest. Just 20% of online users go online every day. - Most Americans (54%) now use a computer either at home, at work or at school. The public favors laws to bar pornography from the Internet, 52% to 41%. - Eighteen percent of PC users own a laptop. Among online users who own a laptop, 29% sometimes go online while traveling. - Eleven percent of home computer owners go online from a “computer room” within their home. But the most popular rooms for cyberspace departure are home office or study (32%) and living room or den (25%). - More than one in four (28%) have had online sessions that lasted as long as three hours or more. - Almost one in four online users (23%) have an “online buddy” they have never met in person. - More than one-third (35%) of online users have received an electronic news clipping or story from a friend.

"In 1995, the Pew Research Center did just that, finding 14% of U.S. adults with internet access. Most were using slow, dial-up modem connections—just 2% of internet users were comparatively screaming along with an expensive 28.8 modem. To put things into further perspective, 42% of U.S. adults had never heard of the internet and an additional 21% were vague on the concept—they knew it had something to do with computers and that was about it. Yet even then, 63% of people who used a computer at home said they would miss it “a lot” if they no longer had one." February 27, 2014