China vaults past USA in total Internet users

[bwhhisc]

China vaults past USA in Internet users - USATODAY.com'

BEIJING — China, already the world leader in cellphone use, has surpassed the USA as the No. 1 nation in Internet users. The number of Chinese on the Internet hit more than 220 million as of February, according to estimates from official Chinese statistics by the Beijing-based research group BDA China. The government is likely to confirm the leap at its half-yearly report in July.

The longtime Internet leader, the USA, which founded and developed the network of computers, had 216 million users at the end of 2007, according to Nielsen/NetRatings.

The percentage of American users — 71% — still exceeds China's 17%. China has 1.3 billion people, compared with nearly 304 million in the USA.

China, however, has a higher growth rate, says BDA's chairman, Duncan Clark. By the end of March, for example, Chinese users climbed to 233 million.

Link:
China vaults past USA in Internet users - USATODAY.com

[clipper]

Originally Posted by bwhhisc

The percentage of American users — 71% — still exceeds China's 17%. China has 1.3 billion people, compared with nearly 304 million in the USA.

When China hits 71% penetration, that's 923 million users and a lot of bandwidth.

[mdw]

Expect exponential growth in bandwidth consumption for a long time to come. We need more, more, more!

Also lots more things hooked up to the 'net. That's why people cry out that we desperately need to switch to IPv6. When a billion Chinese and Indians all have houses using a block of IP addresses for their toasters, washing machines, picture frames, garage door openers, etc. the electronic chatter will be deafening. As the online population increases linearly, the communications traffic, along with the number of endpoints on the network will increase exponentially.

In that scenario it would take a lunatic to forecast decreasing use of domain names. Increasing use of non-English domain names? You betcha