Social networking now bigger than e-mail

Report: Social networking now bigger than e-mail : Ben Patterson : Yahoo! Tech: "That's the word from Nielsen, which reports that the worldwide 'reach' of sites like Facebook and MySpace has now outgrown that of the most popular e-mail services.

According to the Nielsen Company's new report, nearly 67 percent of global Internet users last year went online to use a social networking service of some kind, compared to just 65.1 percent for e-mail. (In case you're wondering, search is still king with a global Net 'reach' of 85.9 percent, followed by 'general interest portals' with 85.2 percent, according to Nielsen.)

Another finding: When you consider global Internet use, about one in every 15 minutes was spent browsing social networking sites like Facebook and MySpace in 2008, the report claims—and apparently, that number is going nowhere but up."