According to Hitwise, in their third installment of the Hitwise Holiday Shopping Series 2004, online Americans in rural districts were 16 percent more likely than all other social segments to visit a shopping site during the four weeks ending Dec. 4, 2004. Bill Tancer, Vice President of Research, Hitwise, said "With the holiday shopping season well underway, Internet users in remote, rural segments are taking advantage of the convenience and comprehensiveness of online retailing. Interestingly, the data indicate that this higher propensity of rural Internet users extends across all socioeconomic segments, from the working class to the transplanted elite."

According to a recent release by The Media Audit, though the younger age groups were the first to embrace the Internet, most of today's growth is being driven by the older age groups, starting at age 55. In the markets surveyed, representing a population of more than 130 million adults, 61.2 percent of all adults visit the Internet regularly. "That's up from 54.9 percent in 2000 and most of the new growth is coming from those over 55 years of age," says Bob Jordan, president of International Demographics, Inc.

A deep look at Internet movie viewers, advertisers and types of Online advertising in the entertainment industry.

A Knowledge Networks (KN) study, How People Use Primetime TV 2004, of television viewing habits, shows that primetime TV is now very much at the service of its users, who increasingly switch channels, multitask while watching, and personally select the programs they see. A comparison to earlier KN studies indicates dramatic changes in the primetime viewing experience over the past 10 years.

Total advertising expenditure for the first nine months of 2004 increased 10.3 percent to $102.4 billion compared to the same time period in 2003, according to data released by TNS Media Intelligence/CMR. "Throughout 2004, the advertising market has experienced steady, healthy growth with increases in all three quarters," said Steven Fredericks, president and CEO of TNS Media Intelligence/CMR. "As we forecasted earlier in the year, third quarter spending for the Olympics and the political season elevated the volume of overall dollars brought into the advertising market."

Twenty-six percent of adult internet (about 33 million people) users in the U.S. have rated a product, service, or person using an online rating system. These systems, also referred to as "reputation systems," are interactive word-of-mouth networks that assist people in making decisions about which users to trust, or to compare their opinions with the opinions expressed by others. Many Web sites utilize some form of this application, including eBay, Amazon, Moviefone and Amihot.

According to the Radio Advertising Bureau Radio Revenue Index, local year-to-date Radio revenue increased 3% the first nine months of this year over that same time period from a year ago, while national ad revenue, up in October, is down only 1% January through October of 2004 when compared to January through October of 2003.