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Other key findings of the research included:

• Adoption of Web applications varies tremendously by category. E-mail and games are the leaders at the moment. Other categories, such as word processing and spreadsheets, still have extremely low adoption.
• Web applications displace traditional applications. Among people who use any Web applications, those apps consume about 40% of the user's total application time. So Web apps are already displacing traditional application use for many people. This trend is likely to cut into the sales of conventional applications over time.
• Security is a looming problem. Fear of security problems is one of the biggest barriers to the further adoption of Web applications.

Traditional software companies are very vulnerable.

The low adoption barriers to Web applications mean that no traditional packaged software company is safe from Web-based competition in the near-term. The time to embrace Web 2.0 development and business practices is now. If packaged software companies wait for the competition to intensify, it will probably be too late.

Improve Web app security now
The latent security fears of many PC users could explode if there's a well-publicized security meltdown in a major Web application. This could derail the current growth in Web app usage. It's important that Web app companies take steps to make their software more secure now, before the insecurities turn into outright fear.

Methodology
More than 2,000 U.S. adults who have personal computers at home were surveyed in the summer of 2007. Windows, Mac, and Linux users were included. Survey participants were randomly selected through a third-party sampling firm.

Adoption & Awareness of Web Applications
Eighty percent of U.S. home PC users say they have heard of Web applications. More than half of them have tried at least one Web app, and more than a third - 37% - say they use at least one Web application on a regular basis.

That means use of Web applications has already spread far beyond the 16% of the population traditionally identified as innovators and early adopters. Web applications are entering the mainstream of US PC users.

(Base: All respondents. Web applications were defined as Web sites that replace a task the user previously did using a software application installed on a PC. Examples were given to ensure comprehension.)

E-mail and games are the leading Web applications

Among people who use Web apps, the most popular use (90%) is sending and receiving e-mail through a browser-based client. Games are next, used by just over 50% of the Web app users, followed by music (25%+) and photo management and editing (30%+).

Web app adoption differs dramatically by application category. Some of the most discussed Web app categories, such as word processing and spreadsheets, have attrac ted only a very small percentage of home PC users to date.

(Percent of Web app users who say they use a Web app in each category. Multiple responses allowed. Base: People who use at least one Web application on a regular basis. To get the percentage of the total home PC population using an application category, multiply these numbers by 37%. For example, less than 2% of U.S. home PC users say they use a Web-based database.)

Web applications consume 40% of total application usage time
Another way to measure the impact of Web apps is to ask how much time people spend using them. People who use Web applications say that they spend about 22% of their total computing time doing so. That amounts to about 40% of the total time they spend with applications of any sort.

That implies that for these users, Web applications are already crowding out much of the users' total application activity. Over time, that's likely to reduce the demand for traditional applications.

(Percent of total computing time devoted to each activity. Base: People who use at least one Web application on a regular basis. To get the percentage of the total home PC population using an application category, multiply these numbers by 37%. For example, less than 2% of U.S. home PC users say they use a Web-based database.)

Web Application Users Versus Non-users
The research attempted to identify characteristics of the people who use Web applications. Are Web apps being adopted most by a particular demographic segment? The answer was generally no, but there were some differences:

• The people who used Web applications were heavier users of applications in general, both Web-based and traditional. Web app users had 28% more applications installed on their computers than non-users. The Web app users also used their computers more heavily.
• Web app users were somewhat more likely to rate themselves as having good technical skills.
• Web app users were slightly better educated but the difference was only a few percentage points.
• There was no significant difference between Web app users and non-users in income, sex, marital status, and presence of children in the family.

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