By Stephen Johnson
VIENNA, VA—Ted Leonsis, vice chair emeritus of AOL, told an audience of several hundred technology entrepreneurs on Friday that Americans now account for only 16 percent of global Internet users, down from 35 percent in 2000, with most of the recent growth occurring in Asia.
Leonsis, one of America’s most influential business leaders, delivered the keynote address at the 5th Annual Bootcamp for Growing Companies & Entrepreneurs hosted by the Business Alliance of George Mason University. About 300 attendees are at the ongoing all-day event.
Leonsis said that global Internet use is growing at 10-15 percent annually, Internet usage at 20-30 percent and monetization at 30+ percent.
He said that more and more Internet content is user generated, with YouTube, Wikipedia and MySpace growing at a much faster rate than traditional sites like Google, Microsoft and Yahoo! The number of page views on FaceBook, for example, has grown at an annual rate of 150 percent over the past two years.
Younger Americans are spending more and more time online, going to sites that feature knowledge sharing (Wikipedia, digg), social networking (FaceBook, MySpace and Second Life), blogs (Technorati gather), Web OS programs (basecamp, writely) and video (YouTube, Sling Media and brightcove).
Meanwhile, the media landscape has radically changed, Leonsis said. Only 25 percent of 30-year-olds read a newspaper daily.
Advertising and circulation at the country’s leading daily newspapers—The New York Times, The Washington Post, USA Today and The Wall Street Journal — have declined precipitously in the last five years. Online traffic and advertising growth, meanwhile, have skyocketed.
Leonsis held numerous leadership positions during his 15-year tenure at AOL. He is a professional sports team owner (the Washington Capitals of the National Hockey League, the Washington Wizards of the National Basketball Association and the Washington Mystics of the Women’s National Basketball Association); Chairman of Clearspring Technologies and Revolution Money; a documentary film producer (“Nanking”); a private-angel investor; and active Board member; and a committed philanthropist.
Other keynote speeches were given by Philip McKinney, Vice President and Chief Technology Officer for the Personal Systems Group of Hewlett-Packard; and Phillip Merrick, Chairman and Co-Founder of VisualCV.com.
The Bootcamp also featured breakout sessions on “Financing Your Business”; “Managing Your Growth”; “Lessons Learned in Human Capital Management”; “Marketing Tips for Growing Enterprises”; “Opportunities in Bio and Life Sciences”; “Opportunities in Enmergy/Environmental Service and Green Technologies”; “Opportunities in Security”, and “Opportunities in Web 2.0 and Telecommunications.”
The Business Alliance of George Mason University was founded in 1988 to support entrepreneurship activities at Mason and to bring business experience into the classroom at the University’s School of Management.
For a more detailed report on Friday’s Bootcamp, visit www.businessalliance.org.
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