Facebook and Blogger Continue to Dominate New Media

Comscore, a global internet information provider, has released its ranking of the top websites in the New Media, and Facebook continues to rise in status and is predicted to surpass Blogger in unique worldwide visitors, as reported by TechCrunch here.

Facebook's meteoric rise in 2008 brings the popular social networking site to a little more than 200 Million unique visits, an increase of 116%. Blogger, the Google-owned bloging platform (blogspot.com), continues to hold the #1 spot at 221 Million.

As a portion of the overall statistics for web traffic, the market share of sites Comscore classifies as "social networking" is impressive. Out of a total 996 Million unique internet users worldwide, an estimated 69.4% of them are somehow active in social networking or new media.

Behind Facebook and Blogger, Myspace and Wordpress held steady or climbed slightly. Microsoft's Windows Live Spaces fell 22% to approximately 87 Million users.

The split between two blogging platforms and two social networking sites occupying the top slots in these traffic rankings indicates the interest of users who have embraced the new media. It appears that blogging and connecting with friends are the two services in highest demand. The blogging sites serve the needs of creatively-driven people who want to post original content on the web, either in the form of journal-like personal narratives, or in forms of commentary and reporting that some have referred to as "citizen journalism".

On the other hand, Facebook and Myspace serve the needs of user who want to form social connections on the web, whether it be around common interests, causes and activism, or real-life, off-line relationships.

Photo-hosting sites like Yahoo-owned Flickr, and sites where users share content like Tagged and Imeem appear further down the list. Link-sharing sites Digg and Reddit do not appear in the top 20.