New Pew Internet Report & Comments

Pew Internet in American Life project just published a new report, Bloggers: A Portrait of the Internet’s New Storytellers. I’ve not read the entire report, but the Summary of Finds are intriguing, and indicative of the increasing practice of participating in our information landscape. My comments are italicized.

• 54% of bloggers in the U.S. are under the age of 30. I find it more interesting that that leaves 46% who are over the age of 30, pre-videogame, TV generation folks, who are making themselves a part of the global conversation.
• Bloggers are less likely to be white than the general internet population. 60% of U.S. bloggers are white, while 74% of Internet users are. 11% of bloggers are African American while only 9% of Internet users are, and 19% are English-speaking Hispanic and 11% of Internet users are. I think that it would be interesting to get such a breakdown on these blogger’s readership.
• 55% of bloggers use a pseudonym.
• There is an interesting breakdown on why people blog. The top reason was to express yourself creatively with documenting your personal experiences a close second. In the ten item list, “To make Money” was the least checked reason.
• Even though 34% of bloggers consider their blogs a form of journalism, 57% include links to original sources and 56% spend extra time trying to verify facts they want to include.
• Bloggers are dramatically more likely to get their news and other content from the Internet than non-bloggers. I would like to know how much content and new bloggers access compared to non-bloggers.
• 45% of bloggers say they prefer getting news from sources that do not have a particular political point of view. But this is roughly the same as non-blogging Internet users. The other 55% still concern me.ther 55% still concern me.

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