Canadians are number one in hockey fandom, love of maple syrup, and using social media - but we might be about to slip to second place on that last one. According to a new report from research firm eMarketer, Canada may lose our status as the country with the most social networking users in the world on a per capita basis. Not a big deal, obviously, but it's always nice to hold the top spot. And who would take over? That would be our neighbours to the south, the United States.
As of last year, eMarketer's report says, 47.4 percent of Canadians were using social media at least once a month, compared with 47.2 percent of Americans. The company predicts that social media use will grow a little faster in the U.S. in 2012, pushing us down to second place. Their report also suggests that there won't be much growth in new users among Canadians in the coming years: they project 2 percent increases in each of the next two years, with a total of 53 percent of the population on social media by 2014.
Even if we lose our top spot, Canadians are still far more connected than the world as a whole. While nearly half of us are on some form of social media, only 17.3 percent of the world's total population currently uses social networks. That percentage is expected to rise sharply, though: eMarketer predicts that by 2014 one in four global citizens will be using social media.
Related stories on Strombo.com:
SOCIAL MEDIA UPDATE: Tweets For Sale, Facebook Privacy, Car Crashes, And Poor, Lonely Google+
@TheStromboShow