Online Brits Still 1.0
A new survey from Nielsen NetRatings entitled ‘The 21st Century Digital Consumer’ shows that most British people are nothing of the sort. The majority of those polled have ‘never heard of’ a slew of new(ish) internet and home entertainment technologies. And this wasn’t a poll of the general population, but of internet users.
| Rank | Term / Acronym | % of Britons online who have ‘never heard of it’ |
| 1 | V-O-D | 75% |
| 2 | Wikis | 70% |
| 3 | IPTV | 69% |
| 4 | Really Simple Syndication | 69% |
| 5 | PVR | 68% |
| 6 | Web 2.0 | 67% |
| 7 | RSS | 67% |
| 8 | Triple-play | 66% |
| 9 | VoIP | 59% |
| 10 | IM | 57% |
However, when researchers referred to these technologies in full, rather than using acronyms, recognition levels soared. 333% more people, for example, understood ‘video on demand’ as opposed to VOD. 350% more had heard of a personal video recorder. Whether this is because the full terms here are fairly self-explanatory is hard to say.
It’s a good reminder,though, for those of use who write technology pieces for a general audience that low levels of understanding and recognition are the norm and we really should do our best to cater for the majority.