April 28, 2009
It seems February’s nervousness is subsiding when it comes to viewing videos online.
Hulu becomes third most trafficed video site
After a 12 percent decline in video traffic during the month, video use rebounded in March, returning to more normal growth trends. Traffic rose 11 in March v. February, according to comScore.
Hulu, the television site started by Fox and NBC, led the way. For the first time, Hulu cracked the top three video sites, passing Yahoo and following just Google (read: You Tube) and Fox Interactive (read: MySpace).
Google accounted for 41 percent of videos viewed on line – by far the leader. Fox’s market share is 3 percent. But it may not remain in second place for long.
Hulu’s share is 2.6 percent and it is closing fast.
Watch out MySpace, your days may be numbered.
1 Comment | 
news, web 2.0 | Tagged: ComScore, Fox Interactive, Google, hulu, MySpace, Online Video, yahoo, you Tube | 
Permalink
Posted by Mark Boslet
April 23, 2009
There are many reasons to explain why MySpace lost ground to Facebook over the past year.
The social networking site that is owned by News Corp. is more commercial than its rival, more infused with advertising and less focused on the desires of users.
Chris DeWolfe steps down at MySpace
There is a perception as well that it is for teenagers, while Facebook has set itself up as mature enough for any age (read: adults).
So it comes as no surprise that CEO Chris DeWolfe left the company on Thursday. But here is an occasionally surprising list of business suggestions for the person tapped to fill DeWolfe’s shoes. It comes from Jason Calacanis, founder of Mahalo:
1) Buy a search engine. They are a great advertising platform;
2) Focus on mobile after admitting that Facebook won on the web;
3) Increase international efforts;
4) Build an entirely new platform while maintaining the existing site;
5) Build a social and casual gaming business;
6) Create a MySpace virtual currency; and
7) Launch an e-mail service.
Excellent advice.
Leave a Comment » | news, web 2.0 | Tagged: Facebook, Jason Calacanis, MySpace, News Corp., Social Networks | Permalink
Posted by Mark Boslet
March 13, 2009
Even social-networking sites can feel the blues.
Growth in traffic rose a reasonable 4 percent in February, compared with last year, but fell 1 percent from December as the world was gripped by the economic crisis, says Hitwise.
Facebook soared during the month, taking it out of the hide of MySpace as older users migrated from the News Corp. property to Mark Zuckerberg’s brainchild.
Traffic to Facebook grew 149 percent while MySpace visits fell 28 percent. Traffic to Tagged skyrocketed 280 percent.
According to Hitwise, the market share ranking among the top social networking sites are as follows: MySpace, 52.2 percent; Facebook, 36 percent; Tagged, 2.5 percent; and MyYearbook, 1.6 percent.
MySpace had the highest amount of time spent on-site: 29 minutes, 38 second.
But here is the most interesting observation. People 18 to 34 make up between 54 and 59 percent of people using Facebook and MySpace. People 35 and older prefer Facebook. Traffic among these older adults increased 23 percent on Facebook while falling 2 percent at MySpace.
Seems Rupert Murdoch can’t related to people his age.
3 Comments | news, web 2.0 | Tagged: Facebook, February, Hitwise, Mark Zuckerberg, MySpace, News Corp., Online TRaffic, Rupert Murdoch, Social Networking, Tagged | Permalink
Posted by Mark Boslet
March 6, 2009
The waning fortunes of MySpace is taking a toll on photo-sharing site Photobucket.
Meanwhile, Flickr is gaining ground, shifting the sands in the online photo-storage world.
According to Hitwise, Photobucket attracted 27 percent of visits to photo-sharing sites in the U.S. in February, down from 36 percent a year ago.
The decline is most likely tied to the decline in visits to social-networking site MySpace, which is owned by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp., says Heather Dougherty, Hitwise’s director of research. MySpace accounted for 54 percent of Photobucket’s traffic in July, but now channels just 38 percent.
Flickr, owned by Yahoo, and Picasa, owned by Google, are less dependent on traffic from social networking sites. Both are owned by search engines and get more traffic from Web-based e-mail services and image searches.
Both also have seen the share of traffic grow, says Hitwise. Flickr attracted 17.9 percent in February while Picasa drew 3.6 percent.
Market Share of photo-sharing sites. Source: Hitwise. (Photobucket, blue; Flickr, yellow; Picasa, grey)
4 Comments | news, web 2.0 | Tagged: Flickr, Google, MySpace, News Corp., Photo Sharing, Photobucket, picasa, Web Sites, yahoo | Permalink
Posted by Mark Boslet
February 9, 2009
Facebook surged past MySpace to become the top social networking site in January, according to compete.
A year ago, MySpace had 2.3 times more visitors than its rival. Now growth has stalled at the property, owned by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp.
Meanwhile, the time users spend on it has fallen sharply since July while time on Facebook has recently edged up. Users now spend as much time on MySpace as they do Twitter.
In January, Facebook had 68.6 million unique visitors compared with MySpace’s 58.6 million. Monthly visits to Facebook were 1.19 billion compared with 810 million to MySpace, compete said.
Twitter had 54 million monthly visits in the month to rank as the third largest social networking site.
The top 11 social networks from compete's list
3 Comments | news, web 2.0 | Tagged: Compete, Facebook, January Visitors, MySpace, Social Networks, Twitter | Permalink
Posted by Mark Boslet
February 6, 2009
For the first time, Facebook topped MySpace in monthly visitors.
Facebook, a social networking site that got its start at Harvard University, attracted 68.56 billion unique visitors in January, an increase of 14.9 percent from December, according to Compete.
Visitors to MySpace fell 1.67 percent to 58.6 million.
That made Facebook the eighth most popular U.S. site, following Google, Yahoo, MSN, Amazon, You Tube, eBay and Live.com.
MySpace, which is owned by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp., was the tenth.
Over the past year, Facebook has seen its audience grow 125.6 percent while MySpace’s has fallen 5.3 percent, Compete said.
Visitors to Facebook exceed those at MySpace in January, according to Compete
Leave a Comment » | news, web 2.0 | Tagged: Compete, Facebook, January, MySpace, Social Networking, Traffic | Permalink
Posted by Mark Boslet
February 5, 2009
The notion of accessing a social networking Web site, such as Facebook, on a television isn’t as far fetched as one might think.
A third of social network users are interested in accessing their sites on the TV
According to a recent study of 1,000 households, more than a third of consumers who use social networks would like to see their networks pop up on the television screen.
“We expect the extension of Web 2.0 technologies to the living room to propel growth in new communities of interest,” says Jason Blackwell, a senior analyst at ABI Research. The ABI study found 36 percent of regular social network users were interested in reaching their favorite sites on the TV.
“Younger consumers were more interested in engaging with their friends through chat and messaging, while middle-aged respondents were more likely to be interested in more passive social networking behavior, such as checking status updates,” ABI said.
The most compelling reason for those over 50 to want social networking on the their TV was to be able to see what their friends were watching.
Leave a Comment » | news, web 2.0 | Tagged: ABI Research, Facebook, MySpace, Social Networking, Survey, Television | Permalink
Posted by Mark Boslet
February 4, 2009
Americans watched 14.3 billion online videos during the month of December, a record and a 13 percent rise from November, comScore says.
Google, with its You Tube video site, drew two out of three of the 150 Americans who went online to view a video – or more than 100 million people.
The average viewer saw 98 videos.
According to comScore, more than three-quarters of Internet users saw at least one video and the average viewer watched 309 minutes. The duration of the average video was 3.2 minutes, but television-viewing site Hulu kept the average user 10 minutes, more than any other top site.
Here are the most popular video sites:
Leave a Comment » | news, web 2.0 | Tagged: ComScore, Fox, Google, hulu, MySpace, Online Video, Record, yahoo, you Tube | Permalink
Posted by Mark Boslet
January 5, 2009
Americans watched 34 percent more videos in November than a year ago, comScore said Monday.
Top video sites
But that is down from 45 percent growth in October.
Internet users in the U.S. viewed 12.7 billion videos online during the month, with Google – the owner of You Tube – capturing 40 percent of total. You Tube is responsible for more than 98 percent of videos viewed on Google sites.
According to comScore, 146 million Americans – or 77 percent of the entire U.S. Internet audience – watched an average of 87 videos per person in the month. The average person looked at 273 minutes of content.
The top sites following Google were Fox Interactive Media, owners of MySpace, Viacom Digital, Yahoo, Microsoft and Hulu.
Leave a Comment » | news, web 2.0 | Tagged: ComScore, Fox Interactive Media, Google, Growth, hulu, Microsoft, MySpace, Online Video, Viacom Digital, yahoo, you Tube | Permalink
Posted by Mark Boslet
January 2, 2009
Yahoo is far from defunct and is still the hottest property on the Web.
Although Google.com had more traffic than any other website on Christmas Eve, if you combine the two Yahoo properties – Yahoo Mail and Yahoo dot com – they surpassed Google with 9.28% of all U.S. Internet visits, according to Hitwise.
MySpace Internet traffic is about twice Facebook’s in the U.S.
Leave a Comment » | analysis, news, web 2.0 | Tagged: Facebook, Google, Hitwise, MySpace, yahoo | Permalink
Posted by TechPulse 360
