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Google passed Yahoo in its share of monthly visitors in the United States for the first time this April, buoyed by growth in search and YouTube videos, according to ComScore statistics released Thursday.

However, underscoring the variability of this sort of measurement, which extrapolates overall data from the usage of a "panel" of users at home and work, ComScore rival Nielsen Online released its own data as well with some different results. Although it also showed Google as No. 1 in terms of unique users, it said Google passed Yahoo way back in January 2007.

ComScore said Google … Read more

Nearly a quarter of all cell phone users in the U.S. say they've seen an advertisement on their phones in the past 30 days, according to a report from Nielsen Mobile, which tracks these trends.

About half of those who saw advertising on their mobile phones in the past month responded to an ad, the report said. In the fourth quarter, there was a big jump in the number or people reporting that they had spotted advertisements on their mobile phones. In fact, this figure rose 38 percent to 58 million users who said they saw advertising on … Read more

Are our friends across the pond getting tired of social-networking sites?

New figures from Nielsen Online, cited by the Guardian in an article Thursday, suggest that they just might be.

Facebook, according to the numbers, experienced a 5 percent drop in U.K. traffic between December and January--as did MySpace.com. Bebo, a smaller presence in the U.S. but wildly popular in the U.K., saw its unique users drop 2 percent in the same period.

If anything, this could mean that after rapid expansion, social networks have reached a saturation point. "It was inevitable that early growth … Read more

Each month, I get a fun little e-mail from Nielsen/NetRatings, the online division of the big-name metrics firm, with some tracking numbers for unique visitors at social media sites--namely, social networks, blogs, and video-sharing sites. They're pretty anecdotal as far as traffic metrics go, but it's still fun to see who's losing and who's gaining--you know, like sports. And each month, I eagerly open the e-mail (no, really) to see if there are any juicy surprises in store. This month's version, which includes numbers for August (percentage growth from August 2006 to August 2007, … Read more

Last week, The Wall Street Journal had a story about Arbitron's People Meter, a new portable device that helps the radio ratings measurement company determine the exact amount of time a user spends listening to particular radio stations. Radio stations insert an inaudible signal that only the device picks up, and testers are supposed to carry the devices at all times, so regardless of where they listen (work, home, car, grocery store), the People Meter knows. This is more accurate than the old way of asking radio listeners to record their habits in a paper diary--users tended not to … Read more

Clearly, social-networking metrics are the new black. It seems like just about everyone wants to know whether Facebook will pass MySpace--or whether there are any trendy, fast-moving start-ups that you ought to be monitoring so that you can start up a profile and amass a healthy friends list before it gets too trendy.

Last month, ComScore released numbers pertaining to social networking's worldwide growth. Now, Nielsen/NetRatings' PR team has released its latest set of figures that track how quickly the top social-networking sites are growing. The results are divided into three different categories of social media: social … Read more

Sony Computer Entertainment America has joined forces with ratings mogul Nielsen to develop a measurement system for the nascent in-game advertising industry, according to a joint release from the two companies on Monday.

Sony will now share its game network data from the PlayStation 3 console as well as the PlayStation Network (which encompasses its new virtual world, PlayStation Home). Nielsen will then combine this with its game usage data, which currently encompasses the activities of more than 12,000 U.S. households. Then, beginning this fall, Nielsen will begin tracking audience statistics and user activity through its GamePlay Metrics system, … Read more