Based on the latest survey by Eurostat in the 27 countries under EU, access of households to the Internet has increased from 49% in the first quarter of 2006 to 54% for the same quarter this year.
Moreover, broadband usage escalated from 30% during the first quarter of 2006 to 42% for the same quarter this year.
Fifty percent use of the online users in EU use online search engines while 15% use Internet telephony and only 13% use P2P software for sharing movies and music.
What is very clear in this study is the wide gap between member countries in terms of technology and pricing. Failure of the government to break monopolies and open up the market is to blame for this disappointing gap.
Winners
Netherlands leads the EU in terms of Internet access (4 of 5) and broadband connections. On the other hand, the French holds the highest record for VoIP calls. When it comes to downloading movies and music, the Dutch and Luxembourgers are the most active.
Losers
Unfortunately, not all countries get overdosed for downloading digital contents and uploading videos to YouTube. Only 1 of 5 Bulgarians has Internet access while the Greeks has the lowest broadband rate of only 7%. Don’t expect Irish and Czechs to know about file sharing or downloading because only 6% use this technology.
Originally posted on December 4, 2007 @ 10:57 am