WASHINGTON — People who have faced one of several common government-related problems in the past two years are more likely to consult the internet than other sources, including experts and family members. In a national phone survey, respondents were asked whether they had encountered 10 possible problems in the previous two years, all of which had a potential connection to the government or government-provided information. Those who had dealt with the problems were asked where they went for help and the internet topped the list: * 58% of those who had recently experienced one of those problems said they used the internet (at home, work, a public library or some other place) to get help. * 53% said they turned to professionals such as doctors, lawyers or financial experts. * 45% said they sought out friends and family members for advice and help. * 36% said they consulted newspapers and magazines. * 34% said they directly contacted a government office or agency. * 16% said they consulted television and radio. […]
WASHINGTON — More than half of Americans visited a library in the past year with many of them drawn in by the computers rather than the books, according to a survey released on Sunday. Of the 53 percent of U.S. adults who said they visited a library in 2007, the biggest users were young adults aged 18 to 30 in the tech-loving group known as Generation Y, the survey by the Pew Internet & American Life Project said. ‘These findings turn our thinking about libraries upside down,’ said Leigh Estabrook, a professor emerita at the University of Illinois and co-author of a report on the survey results. ‘Internet use seems to create an information hunger and it is information-savvy young people who are most likely to visit libraries,’ she said. Internet users were more than twice as likely to patronize libraries as non-Internet users, according to the survey. More than two-thirds of library visitors in all age groups said they used computers while at the library. Sixty-five percent of them looked up information on the Internet while 62 percent used computers to check into the library’s resources. Public libraries now offer virtual homework […]
NEW YORK — About 38 percent of U.S. consumers are watching TV shows online, 36 percent use their cell phones as entertainment devices and 45 percent are creating online content like Web sites, music, videos and blogs for others, according to a new-media survey from Deloitte & Touche. The findings of the online survey of 2,081 Americans, conducted October 25-31, were provided to The Hollywood Reporter before their official release next month. The ‘State of the Media Democracy’ notes that in Deloitte’s first edition of the survey just eight months earlier, 24 percent of consumers used their cell phones as entertainment devices, meaning that usage has soared 50 percent. About 62 percent of ‘millennials’ (consumers 13-to-24-years-old) are using their cell phones as entertainment devices, up from 46 percent in the previous study conducted February 23-March 6, 2007. And among Generation X consumers (25-to-41-year-olds), the number grew to 47 percent from 29 percent in the earlier survey. About 20 percent of consumers said they are viewing video content on their cell phones daily or almost daily. The percentage of consumers watching TV online jumped from the 23 percent figure reported in the previous study. Roughly 54 […]
SAO PAULO, Brazil — Lino Quispelaura left his impoverished neighborhood in Bolivia’s capital two years ago, hoping to earn enough money in neighboring Brazil to come back a rich man. After crossing the width of South America and settling in sprawling Sao Paulo, however, such hopes seem far away for Quispelaura, even farther than his mountainous homeland. Like tens of thousands of other Bolivians here, Quispelaura has sunk into a grinding routine of nonstop, low-paid labor. He wakes before 7 a.m. every day to sew in a cramped garment factory until late at night, then sleeps on a mattress near his sewing machine. He earns barely enough to survive, and if he complains his bosses threaten to have him deported. ‘No matter what people say, it’s hard to get used to this life,’ Quispelaura, 20, said on one of his rare days off. ‘Coming here would have been worth the trouble if life were a little better than before. But I’m not sure it was worth the trouble.’ Driven by dire poverty and political instability in South America’s poorest country, Bolivians now make up one of the biggest cross-border movements of people in the region. […]
Remote Viewing the Year 2060
