I had two clients and a colleague write to me over the past ten days about a recent Online Publishers Association study. Two of the three thought they had a “gotcha” moment, challenging some of the usual “internet is changing everything” stump speech that we like to give. The study indicates that “web users now spend half their time with content, far outpacing timing spent with search, communications and e-commerce.” The study was a four-year analysis of the Internet Activity Index which ranks time spent conducting various online activities.

I have no doubt, and the study concedes, that some logical factors would indicate such a shift. Faster connections enable functional tasks to be completed more quickly. New content sources that are more interesting than just the written word, i.e. video, music, animation, may hold user interest longer. And, there is a heck of a lot of content out there to get through.

All that said, I think the study misses one key point. Creating content, in and of itself, is a form of communicating. Consumer-generated content takes many forms - video, discussion forums, chats, blogs, social networking sites, personal web pages, comments on blogs, and so on. Communicating, at least to me, is the art of listening first, and responding second. Listening online is generally absorbing content, and the return communication or response is often the creation of new content. So, the study is exactly right. Consumers are spending a lot more time absorbing content, but I bet they are communicating a lot more than the statistics in this study would have you believe.