March 15, 2010 by Matt Thomas
Everyone enjoys a good top 10 list, there is just something about them that inspires interest. Yahoo, habitual list makers have released an interesting list of the top 10 news searches made online in the last 15 years.
No prizes for guessing that the number one most searched for news story was arguably the biggest news event of the last few decades in 9/11. This was followed somewhat surprisingly by ‘cloning’ and then by the Iraq war.
Just as interesting as the results of the study, however were the figures that it presented. It was revealed that the number of websites registered on the internet has grown by a staggering amount in 15 years. In 1995 there were approximately 18,000 websites compared with 2010 where there are an estimated 200 million, showcasing the massive growth and influence of the internet in the last decade and a half.
Inevitably the amount of websites is going to be proportional to the amount of users and the study threw up some interesting figures in regards to this also. Yahoo found that the number of users has increased from 10 million worldwide (less then 0.33% of the world population) in 1995 to 1.6 billion (25% of the population) in 2010, basically a 25% rise in 15 years.
Jerry Yang and David Filo founders of Yahoo said: ”These numbers are astonishing, but even more important and more exciting is the impact that the internet is having on so many people around the world.
”From socio-economic opportunities to more accessible healthcare to educating the next generation and beyond, the internet has changed the way we live, work and learn.”
The full list compiled by Yahoo is shown below:
1. September 11
2. Cloning
3. Iraq war
4. Saddam Hussein
5. Harry Potter book releases
6. Michael Jackson death
7. Steve Irwin death
8. Tsunami
9. Enron scandal
10. The Millennium
Related posts:
- Yahoo! announce purchase of Associated Content news service
- Google News Misinterprets Michael Jackson Searches
- Microsoft and Yahoo deal approved by regulators
- Record Traffic for Celebrity and Presidential News – Part 1
- China’s Online Population matches total US Population
- Yahoo! and Bing gain more ground on Google
