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Microsoft whips Google to be number one online --- or does it?
7 comments- TAGS:ComScore, Google, Microsoft
- IT TOPICS:E-Business & Web 2.0, Internet, Operating Systems, Software, Windows & Microsoft
comScore reports that when it comes to time people spend online, Microsoft leads Google by a wide margin -- more than 3.9 billion hours spent online for Microsoft versus more than 2.5 billion hours spent online for Google. But those numbers may be very misleading, and Google may in fact be crushing Microsoft.
comScore measures the amount of time people spend on online "properties." Those properties cover not just Web sites, but services such as instant messenger programs. When comScore rolled up all the numbers, it found that in September, Microsoft properties were well ahead of Google properties, by more than 36%. You can see the numbers below.
Microsoft's lead has widened in the past year. Last September, it was ahead by a little over a billion hours. This September, it's ahead by more than 1.2 billion hours. Even though Google's percentage growth was greater than Microsoft's, Microsoft started off with much higher numbers.
But those numbers are potentially very misleading. They include Microsoft's Windows Live Messenger, which comScore said represents "nearly 70 percent of time spent on the property during the month."
Take away Windows Live Messenger, in other words, and Google crushes Microsoft. The problem for Microsoft is that it's not at all clear how many people who run Messenger actually use it. And even those who do use it, use it very little time out of the day.
On quite a few systems, Messenger launches as a default, and you have to work hard to stop it from launching. That means that many people are running the program and not using it. Yet the hours Messenger spends running is counted as time online for a Microsoft property, even though the service isn't actually being used.
As for those who do use it, how much time are they using it, compared to the time it runs in the background? If someone runs it eight hours a day, it's unlikely they're actually sending and receiving messages for even an hour of that day. So again, usage numbers are inflated.
The upshot of all this is that when it comes to real time spent online, Google most likely is well ahead of Microsoft. And as for time spent online that can be monetized, that's not even close. Google is far, far ahead of Microsoft.
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