One never should mistake media hype for end user reality. At the moment, perhaps 10 percent to 11 percent of U.S. adults actually use an iPhone, a BlackBerry or any other "smart phone." Most of the market has yet to adopt any smart phone.
Conversely, the mass media, and some within the specialized communications media, continue to insist that there is a major problem with broadband access. There are isolated issues, to be sure. But 70 percent of U.S. adults now use the Internet. Average household size is about 2.59 per home. About 74 percent are 18 or older. So adjust the household stats to 1.9 adults 18 or older per home.
Assume those 1.9 adults share a single fixed broadband connection at each location. In other words, a 70-percent "per capita" use of fixed broadband does not directly translate to "70 percent household penetration."
Conversely, 30 percent of U.S. adults do not use the Internet, according to Rubicon Consulting. Assuming those non-Internet-using households have the same average size as Internet-using homes, one might roughly assume that broadband penetration of U.S. adults is less than 70 percent, as studies suggest perhaps six to 10 percent of Internet users use dial-up connections.
Assume dial-up households also have the same size characteristics as Internet-using and no-Internet households. Then we might argue that between 60 percent and 64 percent of U.S. households now buy fixed broadband service. But those 60 percent to 64 percent of U.S. homes represent more than 90 percent of all Internet users.
In fact, if one adds users who use broadband at work, at libraries, using public Wi-Fi or mobile broadband, it is likely that more than 95 percent of all Internet users in the U.S. market already use broadband access the way they would prefer, given all their other buying choices.
The point is simply to keep in imind that what people talk about in the media is not necessarily fully reflective of reality.
No comments:
Post a Comment