The number of Internet users surpassed one billion in 2005 up from only 45 million in 1995 and 420 million in 2000, with India accounting for 50.6 million. While the U.S. continues to lead with nearly 200 million Internet users at the end of 2005, China and India are now in second and fourth place among Internet users.
The two billion Internet users milestone is expected to be touched by 2011, a U.S.-based research and consulting firm has predicted. According to Dr Egil Juliussen of eTforecasts, Much of current and future Internet user growth is coming from populous countries such as China, India, Brazil, Russia and Indonesia. Rapidly increasing Internet adoption in Asia's highly populous developing nations, notably China, India and Indonesia, has helped push the worldwide online population over one billion for the first time.
Juliussen said, These countries will also see strong growth of wireless web usage, and for many new Internet users the cell phone will be their only Internet access device. Internet user penetration is now in the 65 percent to 75 percent range for the leading countries and future growth is limited, the firm indicates.
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