Millions of Canadians creating and sharing content online

It may be time to use the phrase, the people formerly known as the audience, in Canada.

Figures from Stats Canada on internet use show that millions of Canadians are creating and sharing their own content online, which is good news for sites like NowPublic.

20% of people using the internet at home said they contributed content by posting images, writing blogs, or participating in discussion groups. That amounts to almost four million Canadians. More significantly, more than a half of these were under the age of 30.

While email and browsing remain the most popular online activities, it is clear that a considerable number of Canadians, especially among the young, are publishing their material online.

Some have suggested that the figures from Stats Canada may underestimate the true number, as people probably didn’t think of social networking activity such as posting to Facebook as creating content.

This has implications for the media, as it suggests that people are taking advantage of the ability to create and share their own content on the web, rather than passively consuming it.

Overall, Stats Canada found that almost three-quarters, or 19.2 million Canadians aged 16 and older, went online in 2007, an increase of 5% from the last survey in 2005.

The young are leading the way, with 96% of youngsters aged 16 to 24 online, compared to 29% among seniors aged 65 and older.

Net use rose across every province, with British Columbia, Alberta and Ontario emerging as the most connected.

(From Newslab.ca)