Study: Americans Absorb 34 Gigabytes of Data Each Day
Study: Americans Absorb 34 Gigabytes of Data Each Day
Posted 12/09/2009 at 3:59pm
| by Bart Salisbury
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Researchers at the University of California, San Diego have complied a report on information consumption by Americans. In it they estimate for 2008 Americans consumed a total of 3.6 zettabytes and 10,845 trillion words, which averages out to 34 gigabytes and 100,500 words per person. (Collectively, that’s enough to fill “all the hard drives in Minnesota.")
The researchers use a broad definition of information. It includes “flows of data delivered to people...measured in bytes, words, and hours...” Basically, every type of human-made information we come into contact with.
It’s not a surprise that television, in its many forms, dominates the flow, accounting for nearly 45 percent of all content. And, despite the boom in computer technology and the Internet, more than three-fourths of the information we receive comes from non-computer sources. (Looking only at the consumption of “compressed bytes,” however, the report says that computer games rule!)
Nor is it a surprise the report finds our information consumption habits to be “overwhelmingly passive.” For most of us the telephone is our major source of active consumption. (Remote controls don't count.)
Reading, however, is on the rebound, with rates tripling between 1980 and 2008 due to our use of the Internet. (That will come to an end soon, once we get decent text-to-speech going.)
Despite Moore’s Law, which has data processing capacities doubling every two years, our consumption of information is shuffling along at 5.4 percent per year. Analog television is apparently the culprit. As digital and high definition television spread the amount of information consumed will show greater yearly increases.
Before you make too much of all this, please note the report says all of its “results are estimates.”
Image Credit: Global Information Industry Center
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std error
December 09, 2009 at 7:43pm
Of course they're estimates! We're talking about statistics here! They sample the population then draw their numbers. In research for academic journals it is practically impossible to sample the entire population except of course if they are using census data.
gendoikari1
December 09, 2009 at 6:22pm
Well, currently, I probably get less than 34GB a day due to the almost lack of computer gaming (goddamn POS case heater that once was a video card)...
nekollx
December 09, 2009 at 5:50pm
That..might explain my hedaches...if it is 34GB a day i must be near capacity, i only have a 640 GB brain!
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Biceps
December 09, 2009 at 5:10pm
How can it be possible that we Americans can absorb that much information, yet, on average, get dumber every day? One of life's little mysteries, there.
(World) Peace
std error
December 09, 2009 at 7:46pm
Really, do you think that people in the dark ages were smarter than us? Most of them probably couldn't have read this sentence.
praetor_alpha
December 10, 2009 at 5:53am
I'd be surprised if anyone coming out of the public school system could.
Ironmonkaa
December 09, 2009 at 5:07pm
ya thats way off...
People download games that are 6g+ every day, not to mention all the movies
blindhorizon
December 09, 2009 at 4:30pm
hell i absorb that much alone each day from just maximum PC's website...LOL
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