How Popular Is Social Media–Really?

How popular is social media? Perhaps less popular than we think, according to Harris Interactive, who reports that 51% of Americans do not have Twitter, MySpace, or Facebook accounts. (Gasp!) And just five percent of Americans use Twitter, Harris says, despite the ultra-mega-huge gains in traffic that the site has been posting every month. Of course, now that Oprah has started tweeting, that could very well change…

Of the 48% of Americans who are social network users, Harris found that Facebook and MySpace accounts are more popular with the 18-to-34 crowd than the 55+ crowd (no surprise), while people with college education/college degrees tend to engage in social networking more than people with high school education/degrees.  Hmmm, interesting. Wonder what the implications of that might be…

Other findings include that women tend to engage in social networking more than men and that Twitter has broader appeal across a larger age range than social networks, although social networks continue to be more popular–for now–than Twitter.

So even though it might feel like everyone you know is jumping on the Interweb for networking and microblogging purposes, there are probably less people tweeting and Facebooking than it seems.