Just after examining one print publisher’s idea that staying away from the web would be in the best interest for his business, I came across a post on the Nielsen Online Blog indicating that going online is the key to print media’s survival.

As you are no doubt aware, online video has experienced a tremendous year in 2008 in terms of growth and usage. I have personally documented a fair amount of the happenings in the industry over the year myself.

Nielsen is sharing some interesting data today regarding online retail web traffic during the holiday season. This data shows that both Black Friday and Cyber Monday traffic were up by 10% each when compared to last year.

Remember the dive-bombing plane sound we’d make as little kids?  "Neeeerrrrowwww."  That same noise is perhaps the most succinct way of describing what’s happening to traffic-related eBay statistics.

Americans are gluing themselves to the screen more and more. That includes TV, Internet, and Mobile. According to research from Nielsen, as of the third quarter 2008, the average person in the U.S. watched approximately 142 hours of TV in one month.  In addition, people who used the Internet were online 27 hours a month, and people who used a mobile phone spent 3 hours a month watching mobile video.

The U.S. usage of TV, Internet and mobile continues to increase, in the third quarter the average person who used the Internet was online 27 hours a month, mobile users spent three hours a month watching mobile video and TV viewers watch approximately 142 hours of TV in one month, according to Nielsen’s "A2/M2 Three Screen Report."

Nearly 31 percent of in-home Internet activity takes place while the user is watching television, which indicates there is a large amount of simultaneous Internet and television usage, according to a new report from Nielsen’s TV/Internet Convergence Panel.

It’s not April Fools’ Day, and some sort of mathematical miscalculation doesn’t seem to have occurred.  Instead, surprising as the situation may be, Yahoo’s video property appears to have become more popular than the ones owned by Fox, Microsoft, and Nickelodeon.

According to Nielsen Online, nothing earth-shattering happened in terms of search rankings between August and September; Google didn’t finally corner three-fourths of the market, and no major competitors switched positions.  There were some significant losses and gains, though, and they affected the top search companies.

Americans now send and receive more SMS text messages than they do mobile telephone calls, according to the latest research from Nielsen Mobile.

In the second quarter of 2008, the average mobile subscriber sent or received 357 text messages per month, compared to placing or receiving 204 phone calls.

The Dow’s had a bad few months; it lost around 885 points between April and June.  Another market’s doing fine, though, as Nielsen’s statistics indicate that YouTube and several competing video-sharing sites experienced impressive amounts of growth in the same period.

Nielsen has released its first comparable U.S. figures showing video and TV usage on all three screens (Television, Internet, Mobile).

In May the average American watched 127 hours of TV and went online for 26 hours, up 9 percent over 2007. Internet and mobile phone users viewed an average of 2 hours of online video during the month.

Even with the growing popularity of watching television content online, the majority (94%) of adults still prefer to watch television on traditional TV sets, according to research from Nielsen for the Cable & Telecommunications Association for Marketing (CTAM).

Internet usage reporting may be the next free thing from Google, a service that would put them in competition with companies that charge a hefty premium for such information.

The Internet ad business is doing pretty well, according to a new Nielsen Monitor-Plus report.  While spending in the advertising industry as a whole failed to grow by even a single percentage point between the first quarters of 2007 and 2008, online ad impressions rose by 14.7 percent.

Google’s dominance in desktop search is transferring nicely to cell phones, according to new statistics from Nielsen Mobile.  In fact, an almost complete sameness has been achieved.

Making purchases using mobile devices such as cell phones is increasing in the U.S. with 9 million mobile subscribers saying they have used their mobile to pay for goods or services and nearly half (49%) saying they plan to try mobile commerce in the future according to a new report from Nielsen.

Men were found to be more likely then women to use their mobile phone for commerce with 4.9 million men doing so and 4.3 million women making a purchase using their mobile phone.

Almost two years ago, an award-winning Google paper outlined a way to link a computer with a television to collect real-time data about viewer actions. The implications of the technology Google was working on could spell trouble for Nielsen Media Research, the incumbent, go-to agency providing the data upon which TV ad prices have been based for half a century.

The Hollywood Reporter, which covers the movie industry, has redesigned its Web site and says it will feature more charts, more data and more of a business focus.

"The re-launch of our brand is the culmination of a year-long drive to position the Reporter as the leading source of timely and actionable news, information and data about the creation, financing, production, marketing and distribution of entertainment content in all its forms, on all platforms," said Eric Mika, Publisher of The Hollywood Reporter.

Another month, another Nielsen Online data set.  Only the unexpected has happened, and this time around, Google’s market share didn’t rise.

The stock market has stopped doing 200-point dives, and for a time, it seemed like another hallmark of recessions had also become rare.  Unfortunately, some "restructuring" has once again occurred, and employees of Nielsen Business Media were the ones to be affected.