© Mark Ollig
We find ourselves halfway through a year none of us will ever forget.
The latest statistics confirm the world’s dependency on the internet is significantly increasing.
Since March, the internet has provided the means for many of us to work from home, have telehealth visits, and stay connected with family and friends.
Some of us do weekly grocery shopping online, drive to the store, and have our items brought out to our car.
Students, who at the beginning of the year took classes in a brick-and-mortar school, participated in their courses online.
Currently, the world’s population is approximately 7.8 billion people.
Nearly 4.8 billion people on the planet have access to and regularly use the internet. The top numbers and locations are as follows:
1. Asia – 2.4 billion.
2. Europe – 768 million.
3. Africa – 552 million.
4. Latin America – 480 million.
5. North America – 345 million.
6. The Middle East – 187 million.
7. Australia – 288 thousand.
China has the highest number of internet users at 854 million, while the number of internet users in the United States is 313 million.
Of North Korea’s 25.5 million people making up its general population, those having access to the internet is zero.
As of April, 3.81 billion people living on the planet are active in using online social media networks, like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, Snapchat, and Pinterest.
WordPress.com is a favorite resource used to build and host websites on the internet. The current number of websites using WordPress is 455 million.
There are about 1.7 billion websites on the internet, and nearly 60 percent use HTTPS (HyperText Transport Protocol Secure) internet application protocol for security.
The top common languages and their percentages used on the internet are:
1. English – 25.9 percent.
2. Chinese – 19.4 percent.
3. Spanish – 7.9 percent.
4. Arabic – 5.2 percent.
5. Indonesian/Malaysian – 4.3 percent.
6. Portuguese – 3.7 percent.
7. French – 3.3 percent.
8. Japanese – 2.6 percent.
9. Russian – 2.5 percent.
10. German 2 percent.
The ranking of ages and their percentage of US internet users are:
1. 18 to 29 – 100 percent.
2. 30 to 49 – 97 percent.
3. 50 to 64 – 88 percent.
4. Over 65 – 73 percent.
Accessing the internet is accomplished more with smartphones than with desk and laptop computers.
Each day, smartphone users spend nearly four hours using a mobile internet connection for apps or researching information.
Speaking of apps, the following app stores list their number of apps available for mobile users to download:
1. Google Play Store – 2.6 million.
2. Apple App Store – 1.8 million.
3. Windows Store – 670 thousand.
4. Amazon Appstore – 490 thousand.
As of April, here are the number of users on the most popular social networks:
1. Facebook – 2.6 billion.
2. YouTube – 1.8 billion.
3. Facebook Messenger – 1.3 billion.
4. WhatsApp – 2 billion.
5. Sina Weibo – 500 million.
6. Reddit and Twitter – 330 million.
7. Pinterest – 320 million.
8. Snapchat – 229 million.
Imagine what our lives would have been like if the Coronavirus/COVID-19 had occurred during the 1970s.
Back then, the technology, hardware, software, and a network for online schooling and working from home did not yet exist.
Today, the internet, along with advanced technology, has become the core pillar of connecting billions of us throughout the world, whether in our office, school, or at home.
Stay safe out there.
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| (ClipArt image Right-to-Use paid by me!) |