Internet Use on the Rise

According to research by Amy Bradshaw, internet usage has been increasing dramatically over the past 14 years. In 1996 there were an estimated 37 million internet users worldwide. In just 5 years that amount increased roughly 5.5 times. In 2004 that number had risen to an estimated 407 million users. The countries with the leading percentages of internet users to population size in 2004 were Canada, Korea, Japan, and the U.S. Their internet user percentages are 41%, 40.3%, 45%, and 43% respectively. In 2001, the Global Internet Policy Initiative (GIPI) was started by the U.S. and other countries to narrow the digital divide and work to get open and democratic access to Internet. With numbers like this from 6 years ago, it is almost unbelievable how many users there must be now.