History writers will someday have a field day characterizing the impact of the Internet on the waning years of the 20th century and the dawning years of the 21st century.
"I believe that its invention is as important to the dissemination of knowledge, to peoples' lifestyles and to the way we'll be conducting business in coming years as the invention of the Gutenberg press was in 1453," said technology icon Harry Newton, describing the Internet in the 14th edition of his "Newton's Telecom Dictionary."Other contemporary commentators have a hard time finding an adequate supply of superlatives to describe the growth of the Internet and its two most notable components: e-mail and the World Wide Web. Businesses promote their Web address ahead of their street address. Phone numbers take a back seat to e-mail monikers. Governments both use the Internet and debate how and whether to police it.
And the ultimate sign of the worldwide computer network's societal impacts: The Internet now has its own beauty contest, crowning the first Miss Internet World recently.
The United States Internet Council took a snapshot of the technology in a report that will be published soon. The council's State of the Internet report compiles data collected from a number of research organizations that characterize the Internet's impact at the turn of the century.
In the United States and across the globe, here is some of what the council found:
Since its birth in 1969 with the connection of three host computers in the United States, the Internet has grown to include more than 43.2 million host computers worldwide as of January, according to an annual survey by Network Wizards. About 60 percent of all host computers are located inside the United States. Growth rates suggest the number of hosts worldwide could reach 100 million by 2001.
About 90,000 Americans had access to the Internet in early 1993. That number had grown to about 81 million in early 1999, an increase of some 900 percent. Worldwide, Computer Industry Almanac found 61 million Internet users at the end of 1996, 148 million at the end of 1998 and has projected 320 million by the end of 2000.
The number of U.S. households with Internet access has grown from 5.8 million in 1994 to 38.8 million today, according to Forrester Research, which predicts 60 million households will have Internet access by 2003. More than half of all U.S. households will have access by 2003, Forrester projects. By comparison, the 30-percent household penetration rate took 38 years for the telephone, 17 years for television and 13 years for personal computers. Once the Internet became available to households with the advent of the World Wide Web, it took less than seven years to reach the 30-percent penetration level.
The number of pages on the World Wide Web was 829 million in 1998, according to International Data Corp., which projects the number will grow by 75 percent to 1.45 billion by the end of 1999, and 7.7 billion by 2002.
E-mail is the most popular component of the Internet, used by 84 percent of Internet users, according to eMarketer. The Yankee Group reports 263 million e-mail mailboxes worldwide, with estimates on e-mail traffic ranging from a low of 618 billion messages in 1998 to as many as four trillion. Iconocast forecasts a volume of 7 trillion-plus e-mail messages in 2000. Forrester Research projects half of the U.S. population, 135 million people, will use e-mail by 2001.
Some surveys indicate the average e-mail user sends and receives up to 25 or 30 e-mail messages per day. E-mail is becoming a more important business tool than the telephone. The United States Postal Service delivered about 101 billion pieces of paper mail in 1998 while 618 billion e-mail messages were sent that year.
Women made up slightly less than one-quarter of the Internet population in 1995 but account for roughly half of the population now, depending on the research. Media Metrix reported in a December study that 55 percent of online shoppers were women.
Concerns persist about a "digital divide" that separates the haves from the have-nots online. A 1997 poll by Lou Harris & Associates and Baruch College estimated the percentage of black or Hispanic online users was only 6 percent for each group. Forrester Research recently found Internet access for black Americans currently at 23 percent, and it's expected to reach 40 percent by 2000. Access for Hispanics is currently at 36 percent, expected to reach 43 percent by 2000. Some 64 percent of Asian Americans use the Internet with 68 percent expected to be Internet users by 2000.
In a related study, U.S. Internet users with at least a bachelor's degree were estimated at 46 percent in 1996 and 36 percent in 1998, according to IntelliQuest Information Group. The same study found 60 percent of Internet users had annual incomes of $50,000 or more in 1996; 54 percent by the end of 1998.
The average age of Internet users in 1996 was 32, according to Cyber Atlas. A 1996 Georgia Tech study put the average age at 35 while other studies suggest the Internet population getting slightly older and more representative of the U.S. population in general.
The dollar volume of business-to-business electronic commerce in 1998 was $27.4 billion, according to International Data Corp. The projected volume is $64.8 billion for 1999, $138.8 billion in 2000, $270.9 billion in 2001, $526.4 billion in 2002 and $978.4 billion in 2003. According to Forrester Research, an estimated five million U.S. households shopped on the Internet in 1997, 10 million in 1998 and 13 million forecast for 1999. The research estimates the dollar volume of business-to-consumer sales at $14.9 billion for 1998, $31 billion for 1999, $50.7 billion in 2000, $78 billion in 2001, $116.5 billion in 2002 and $177.7 billion in 2003.
Three million U.S. households had access to online financial services -- banking, stock trading, etc. -- in 1997, Forrester Research estimates. The number rose to 3.7 million in 1998, is forecast for 5.3 million this year, 7.2 million in 2000 and 22 million by 2003.
Most users still gain access to the Internet over copper phone wires. By 2000, Jupiter Communications predicts 35.2 million households will connect over copper phone lines while 2.9 will connect via cable and 500,000 will connect using wireless and satellite systems.
More than 67.5 percent of the U.S. population lives in counties served by more than 10 Internet service providers that offer local dial-up service. About 14.5 percent live in areas where they have one to three choices for Internet service and 7.5 percent have no local Internet service in their county, according to Northwestern University research.
The report concludes that government interest in policing the Internet will continue to grow along with the Internet itself and suggests policymakers turn their focus toward improving access and away from impeding competition, and that they work to dissolve economic, social and ethnic exclusions.
To see the complete pre-publication report, see http://www.usic.org.