Stats for internet usage for 2005 were just released and so I thought I would share some of the interesting facts. Full article can be read here. Also I have a thing against stats so I will play a bit of devils advocate on it.

-Alberta has the second highest internet usage in the country at 71%. This does not mean that people use it often. It could mean that someone had used the internet once.

-88% of hoseholds with an income over $86,000 use the internet. Compared to 61% below that line. I assume that most people surveyed are under this income line (I could be wrong) so the distribution of data could totally throw this stat out the window.

-Not supprisingly the biggest use of the internet at home is email. I agree with this stat as email is the gateway program that leads to surfing, chatting, and ebay.

-The broadband usage stats are confusing but what I took away was that 18% of users are on dial up connections. This makes sense as rural users have no access to broadband connections but have kids (an earlier stat suggests that homes with children usually have internet access)

-One interesting point was that 12% of people who had a computer and did not use the internet said they did not because it was too hard to use. I am supprised at this as my grandma uses the internet and her self cleaning oven is too hard to use but who am I to judge?


Stat Bashing

As I stated I have a thing against stats as they get abused so I try to look at them a little more arbitrarily. But here are some fun ones:

-In ww1 the number of head injuries jumped dramatically after the introduction of helmets. The reason for this is that head fatalities were not counted as injuries so now the helmets were saving lives but the soldiers were still being injured.
-Most car accidents occurr within 10 blocks of home or work. Leading people to beleive that they get lazy close to their typical destination. Well statistically you are within 10 blocks of home or work most of the time so therefore a much higher chance of being in that area and being in an accident.
-MY favorite stat is always the 9 out of 10 insert profession here agree stat. If you shrink your sample size down to 10 people you will get this stat easily or it is just as easy to change the parameters on the data to filter it in the best way. i.e. filter the data to be dentists between the ages of 30 and 31 and ta-da the most favorable number appears.

A few quotes

Lies, damn lies and statistics.
- Mark Twain

47.3% of all statistics are made up on the spot.
- Steven Wright