European 16-24 year-olds spend more time online than watching TV, and other useful stats

Two stories in today’s Guardian make for an interesting juxtaposition and indicate that employers of the future have a rude awakening.

First up, a report by the paper shows employers are cracking down on the amount of time staff use the internet and in particular, social networks. A deeper read reveals that the investigation has only covered the public sector but still shows 1,700 staff have been diosciplined or sacked in the past three years for mis-use of the internet or email. Trade Unions also calims they are dealing with an increase in the number of disputes involving social networks.

Contrast this with the story a bit further on about young people aged 16-24 are spending longer than ever before on the internet and the number of people using social networks has doubled from 23% last year to 42%.

So as employers crack down on people connecting and socialising online, today’s young people (and tomorrow’s workers) are spending even more and more of their lives on the interent. Hopefully when they come to the world of work employers will have realised just how integral (not to mention useful) the internet and social web can be.

The report (produced by the European Interactive Advertising Association) also found:

• an increase in instant messaging and the message functions
  of social networks use which has led to a decrease in email (see also, Robin Goad’s recent post)
  
• 81% of surfers say they have sent an
  email at least once a month over the past year, down from 85% in 2006
• internet users across Europe (7,000 specially selected
  people across 10 European countries) are spending an
  average of nearly 12 hours a week on the internet
• Italians
  are the heaviest users (13.6 hours per week), followed by the
  Swedes (13 hours) and the French (12.7 hours). The British – in
  seventh place – spend 12 hours a week, up from 11.3 hours in 2006. The
  Dutch are last on 9.8 hours
• Almost a third of European web users have watched a TV,
  film or video clip, compared with 12% last year.
• The EIAA study shows the effect on TV viewing, especially
  among the youth audience which is using the internet more often than TV
  for the first time. The survey shows that 82% of 16- to 24-year-olds
  use the web between five and seven days a week while only 77% watch TV
  as regularly – a drop of 5% from last year

Technorati tags: European Internet Useage Statistics, Guardian, social networks, employment