pew internet

Parents are more worried about advertisers having access to their children's online data than about their children talking to strangers online, according to a report published today.

The Pew Internet Project and the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University collaborated on the report, which is based on a survey if 802 parents of children aged 12 to 17 with questions about social-networking sites, namely Facebook. As more and more teens and pre-teens use social media as a part of their every day communications , the study finds that parents worried about a variety of online dangers -- … Read more

A little more than half of Internet stakeholders surveyed by Pew Internet expected -- or more likely were optimistic about -- a future with greater corporate responsibility when it comes to supporting human rights through technology, according to a study released today (PDF).

The study highlights the ongoing discussion of the tech industry's role in politics, activism, and freedom speech. Recent news highlighting growing discontent of censorship and unethical business practices further push the issue.

The study examined how far tech companies will go to help oppressive governments when it comes to controlling access to technology or following unethical … Read more

The fraction of "online" adults who use Twitter on a typical day has quadrupled over the past 18 months -- to 8 percent from 2 percent, according to a new Pew report on Internet use. Eight percent is roughly one user in twelve (a little less, actually.)

Pew defines an online adult as someone who uses the Internet and/or e-mail, at least occasionally. According to Pew, 80 percent of all U.S. adults go online.

Smartphones may have had something to do with increased Twitter usage, Pew suggests, "because smartphone users are particularly likely to be … Read more

Mobile devices are bringing more Americans online, but one in five adults is still not on the Internet, according to a Pew Internet survey published today.

The study, based on more than 2,000 phone calls in English and Spanish, shows that certain segments of the U.S. population are not inclined to go online. The top reasons given were lack of interest, no computer, expense, or the difficulty of getting online.

"Senior citizens, those who prefer to take our interviews in Spanish rather than English, adults with less than a high school education, and those living in households … Read more

The holidays were certainly prosperous for the tablet industry.

The number of U.S. tablet owners just about doubled from 10 percent to 19 percent between the middle of December and the start of January, according to a Pew Internet report out today.

Coming from a period of flat growth since the summer, tablets enjoyed a surge during the holiday season as lower-cost devices such as the Amazon Kindle Fire and Barnes and Noble's Nook tablet reached shoppers just in the nick of time.

But tablet vendors weren't the only ones on a holiday hot streak.

E-book readers … Read more

App users are a tight-fisted bunch, according to a recently released Pew Internet & American Life study. Pew reports that only 46 percent of U.S. cell phone and tablet users who have downloaded apps have paid for one.

That means that 16 percent of adults in the United States have paid for an app. That's a boost from the 13 percent polled by Pew who reported parting with their cash in May 2010.

Pew queried 2,260 adults over the age of 18 between July and August of this year, including 916 interviews conducted over cell phones. The numbers might not look so rosy for app developers who would much rather have paying customers than freeloaders.… Read more

A new study entitled Teens, Kindness and Cruelty on Social Networks confirms much of what we already know about cyberbullying. Most kids aren't bullied and most kids don't bully either online or off.

In fact, the study--conducted by the Pew Internet & American Life Project for the Family Online Safety Institute and Cable in the Classroom--concluded that "[m]ost American teens who use social media say that in their experience, people their age are mostly kind to one another on social network sites." Nearly seven in ten (69 percent) of teens said that peers are mostly … Read more

Foursquare and similar location-based check-in apps might sound silly to some, but they're gaining in popularity nonetheless.

A new survey from the Pew Internet & American Life Project has found that at least 28 percent of U.S. adults have found a liking for mobile and social location-based services.

Kathryn Zickuhr, a Pew Internet Project research specialist and co-author of the report, explained in a statement:

Americans are not currently all that eager to share explicitly their location on social media sites, but they are taking advantage of their phones' geolocation capabilities in other ways. Smartphone owners are using … Read more

One of the many findings of a recent Pew Research Center study called "Americans and their cell phones" is that "42 percent of cell phone owners used their phone for entertainment when they were bored."

The study also found that 40 percent or respondents have used their phone to deal with an emergency and that "13 percent of cell owners pretended to be using their phone in order to avoid interacting with the people around them." For more, see Eric Mack's post "Ever faked a cell phone call? You're not alone.&… Read more