“Maybe Canadians have more friends” was the title heralded by Alex Mindilin of International Herald Tribune.
He was referencing how recent Comscore results revealed that Canadians
were more likely to use a social network site then Americans were. Well
categorically I will state that just recently there hasn’t been a lot of love going around for Analytics company Comscore, this perhaps leads to the information becoming a little vague and untrue.
According to InternetWorldstats.com 84.3% of Canadian internet users
are on broadband, as opposed to the 72.5% of North American users on
broadband. But how can there be such a large difference, is it to do
with how cheap the plans are for users and what each service can offer
users, well one thing is for sure according to a cbc.ca article it is impossible to find an unlimited download package in Canada.
Another thing I noted that largely relate to younger users of social networks in the teenage years is how more and more schools and education centres in Canada are starting to ban it from being used,
this in my opinion draws them in to getting as much use of it as
possible during their free time out of school, we all know how influential young people are becoming around social networks. However even Facebook, the most popular social network in Canada doesn’t seem to know where the key “tipping point” is for so many Canadians to use Facebook, but puts particular note to the Toronto, ON network has over 500,000 users signed up.
However, as much as it may appear according to my previous analysis
that social networking is definitely having very positive growth in
Canada, it may be noted that studies have been carried out that detail
how around 4 in 10 Canadians don’t use social networks giving reasons
such as “they would rather keep in touch in other ways” or “they
weren’t safe”. These opinions appeared to be shared by a more senior
community, however the article does go onto say that a third of over
50’s have visited a social networking site.
I can understand why they wouldn’t be compelled to join, especially
as many of their younger grandchildren and even children would simply
be “throwing sheep” or sending them “pokes”, an online activity more
commonly conducted on the social network Facebook. However according to
figures cited from an IHT Article there are roughly the same amount of internet users aged 55 or over as there are 18-34 year olds!
I do believe that as Canadians have taken a definite shine to social networking,
it begs the question of how Americans spend their time online. I
logically can’t believe that the usage is as low as some may claim in
North America, however is the issue largely related to the social
networking scene in North America not being as active because there are
so many more services available to them then Canada have. I mean does
North America for instance spend more time watching videos on Youtube
or playing games, or is it down to the fact Canadians just love to be
part of a Facebook group, page or social organization?
