PALO ALTO, Calif. In an indication of how much the Internet has evolved from its roots as a male-dominated research medium, a new study shows women on the Web now outnumber men, and their ranks are growing far faster.
The study, released on Wednesday by Media Metrix and Jupiter Communications, shows strong increases in all age groups of women using the Internet in the United States, except for those between 18 to 24. Their usage actually declined from last year.
"Women in the college age group appear to have more off-line interests, and more off-line business to take care of," suggests Anne Rickert, a Media Metrix analyst and coauthor of the study.
"Everyone has a life off-line, but some age group's find their off-line lives are better served by on-line resources. For the 18 to 24 age group, aside from academics and some shopping, the Web perhaps does not directly relate to their lives." Overall, the study found that during the first quarter of 2000, women and girls made up 50.4 percent of the total U.S. Web audience the first time in the history of the Internet that they have outnumbered men.
And going forward, they appear poised to pick up more market share. While the total number of Web users grew by 22.4 percent during the past year, the number of female users grew by 34.9 percent.
Particularly strong growth was found among teenaged girls. The study found the number of female Web users between 12 and 17 shot up 125 percent over the past year, a jump researchers credit to the success of teen-focused sites like gurl.com and kibu.com catering to the adolescent yearning for a sense of belonging.
"The Internet is really tailor-made for this," said rickert.
"To me, the teen statistics were a real highlight of the study." If teens go on-line for social reasons, as women get older they appear to make more practical use of their time on-line, often logging on for information about health, child care, vacations and financial planning.
The study also found many consumer product sites, providing information on items ranging from indigestion medicine to dog food, had disproportionate numbers of female users, suggesting how many women were making buying decisions for their households.
Across all adult age groups, the list of top women's Websites looked a lot like the rankings for the entire population. America On-line Inc.'s network of Web properties was the most popular destination among women over 18, followed by the Microsoft Corp.
and Yahoo Inc. sites.
Although several of the women's community sites like clubmom.com, women.com and oxygen.com, reach large numbers of women, the general-interest, gender-neutral Internet portals remain far more popular.
One final surprise was that several women's community sites like women.
com and village have male users comprising upwards of 30 percent of their total audience.
"We do have a lot of good generic content," said Annie Ellicott, vice president of marketing for women.com. She suggested men might use women's sites for games, horoscopes, and "other information that they feel uncomfortable talking about." The findings were based on a survey of 55,000 people in the United States.
(Reuter)