• by April 6, 2001

It's official. Whenever there's a huge event on TV, expect the corresponding websites to boast huge increases in traffic in the following days.

As you may remember, the Super Bowl is the first and best example of this phenomenon - daily traffic to SuperBowl.com at home spiked 269% on that Sunday.

Not surprisingly, the Oscars, referred to by some demographics watchers as "Super Bowl for Women," is a close runner up.

The Internet ratings report for the week ending April 1 from Nielsen//NetRatings, shows that traffic to EOnline.com spiked 160% to 1.5 million unique visitors, as surfers at work jammed the site to view celebrity fashion and news coverage of the Academy Awards. Oscar fashions of various celebrities lead the growth. Jennifer Lopez commanded the top page viewed on the site with 29.3% of all visitors. Penelope Cruz followed with 16.9% of visitors viewing her photo. Catherine Zeta-Jones appealed to 16.6% of the site's audience, while Hillary Swank drew 15.7% of visitors.

Rounding out the top five was Renee Zellweger, who attracted 15.6% of the audience. Best actor winner, Russell Crowe, was the top male page viewed on the site, taking the No. 10 spot with 13.2% of the site's visitors.