Nielsen

September 29, 2009, MediaPost — If social networks are truly transforming how consumers communicate, shouldn't they be affecting the Web's original killer app: email?  Not at all, according to preliminary data from Nielsen. To the contrary: "It actually appears that social media use makes people consume email more, not less, as we had originally assumed -- particularly for the highest social media users," says Jon Gibs, VP of media analytics at Nielsen.

WASHINGTON, September 22, 2009 — Facebook, in a move aimed at boosting its appeal to advertisers, teamed up with measurement company Nielsen on Tuesday to allow marketers to better gauge ad performance on the social network.

Now visited by over two-thirds (67 percent) of the global* online population, “Member Communities,” which includes both social networks and blogs, has become the fourth most popular online category – ahead of personal email. It is growing twice as fast as any of the other four largest sectors (search, portals, PC software and email), according to The Nielsen Company’s “Global Faces and Networked Places,” a comprehensive report published today revealing the new global footprint of social networking.