• by July 18, 2000

The Internet ratings report for the month of June 2000 from Nielsen//NetRatings indicates that half of the sites in the Top 10 Biggest Audience Gainers were media sites, including Napster.com, Real.com, Ugo.com, CBS.com and NetBroadcaster.com. Each site increased its unique audience at-home by at least 775,000 visitors from May to June, together representing 14 million Web users during June.

TS Kelly, director of Internet media strategies at NetRatings, said, “The blurring of media lines will continue as bandwidth and streaming quality increases. As we've seen, people are flooding to sites such as CBS.com or BigBrother2000.com, using the Internet as a supplemental entertainment medium to television.

Top 10 biggest audience gainers in the May-June period were Expedia.com, Magazineoutlet.com, Napster.com, Real.com, Ugo.com, Alta-vista.net, CBS.com, Netbroadcaster.com, Bluestreak.com and Freestation.com.

NetRatings also reported that top portals have effectively leveraged their audiences' captive attention for e-commerce, offering consumers a one-stop virtual shop for users' needs. The top portal-affiliated shopping site, Yahoo! Shopping, attracted 5.8 million unique home-based visitors during the month of June, equating to just under 7% of all Internet users during the month.

AOL's Shopping Channel drew more than 3.4 million and AltaVista's shopping area captured the attention of 2.6 million unique visitors. MSN's shopping section engaged 1.2 million unique shoppers. Lisa Ann Strand, senior Internet analyst at NetRatings, said portals have “matured,” turning from large directories that helped users find places to go, to “home bases” that now serve as communities offering their own content, services and tools to help enrich a user's Web experience.”

Top portal-affiliated shopping sites in June were Yahoo!, AOL, Alta Vista and MSN.