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Social Networking, Online Video, Top Digital Trends

Online video and social networking are outpacing other digital media behaviors, according to a study released Thursday.

Ipsos Insight released some findings of its annual study "The Face of the Web 2006." The survey, conducted in November and December 2006 among a random sample of 6,553 adults around the world, found that online video activities have replaced music as the driver of digital media's growth.

Thirty-six percent of U.S. Internet users watched a TV show or other video streaming online at the end of 2006, up from 28% at the end of 2005, and three-quarters had done so in the 30 days before polling. Brian Cruikshank, executive VP and managing director of Ipsos Insight's Technology & Communications practice, said consumer appetite for video content has accelerated the adoption of online video behaviors.

In the U.S. market and others where homes are saturated with televisions and DVD players, video content is a predominant part of consumers' daily lives, he said in a prepared statement.

"Increasing penetration of broadband access and PC ownership globally signals that the PC will begin to really assert itself as a 'second screen' within the household," he said.

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