More than 100 million Americans will be on the Internet by the end of this year, according to Jupiter Communications, a New York research firm. But are we making the most of our time on the Web? The Web is even more of a maze than it was a few years ago. The sheer number of tantalizing sites has exploded. Consumers are barraged by television ads for dozens of new cool-sounding dot-coms. And most of us don't have the time - or the attention spare - to search around and find the newest and best stuff.

"People are pretty overwhelmed," says Malcolm Maclachlan, a media e-commerce analyst at International Data Corp., a research firm in Framingham, Massachusetts. "Even in the last few months, the noise has been turned up so much."

The din has gotten to Kevin McKenzie. Although the 28-year old works in the Internet industry, he regularly consults only a handful of sites. Most of those are from companies he already has a relationship with in the real world, such as Macys.com. "Being in the San Francisco Bay area, I don't hear anything but dot-com commercials," says Mr. McKenzie, associate vice-president, commerce group, at CNET Inc., an online publisher of technology news in San Francisco. "It's a little overwhelming."

Mr. MCKenzie says the sites he does consult save him time. "I use the Web to manage my life," he says. "I can work late hours and not have to worry about going home to a bunch of bills."

Indeed, most Web surfers use the Internet for utilitarian reasons, according to a recent survey from IDC. About 68 per cent of online users read news, 56 per cent check out the weather and 50 per cent get financial information or services. A mere 9 per cent say they use it for entertainment.

When the honeymoon ends
Many newbies - those who have recently come on-line - have a kind of honeymoon period with the Internet. They are often eager to try a bunch of new sites and services. But once people have been on the Internet for a while and the "cool" factor wears off, users tend to settle into patterns, checking only the few sites that have managed to hold their attention or the ones they've decided to park some personal information with, such as their stock portfolio. According to Jupiter Communications, almost three quarters of users who have been online for more than two years primarily navigate the Internet via book-marks - those lists of favorite sites that users save on their browers.

So, how do people get information on the latest sites? Susan Shapiro, a 52-year-old real-estate broker in Basalt, Colorado, often finds out about them from TV commercials. "There was a thing the other night on Snap.com," an Internet portal, she says. "I immediately wrote that down and thought, I've got to check out that Web site."

In addition, search engines and surfing are clearly another way that people learn what's new on the Web. Search engines still consistently rank as the most visited sites. According to Media Metrix Inc., a New York company that tracks Web traffic, eight of the top 10 sites in September were portals, megasites like those from Yahoo! Inc. and Excite At Home Corp. that include search as a critical element.

Terri Johnson, a 45-year-old special-education teacher in Waukesha, Wisconsin, begins most of her time online with her students at Yahoo, Excite and AltaVista, a unit of CMGI Inc. in Andover, Massachusetts. "Once you get into those sites, they lead to others," Ms. Johnson says. "There are just so many sites for the kids." She spends two hours online at school and another two hours online at home, partly to keep up with her Internet-savvy students. Her middle-school kids often spend more time on-line than the teachers do.

Addicted to the Net
Then there are the junkies. While the average online user spends about seven hours a week on the Internet, some treat it like an appendage. Saul Jacobson, a 31-year-old lawyer in Washington, D.C., has spent about five hours online every day for the past year.

While slow dial-up speeds and browser crashes have deterred many Web surfers from spending many hours online, as high-speed cable and DSL, digital subscriber telephone lines, connections become commonplace and more gadgets like cellular phones and Palm Pilots come with Internet access, the Web will most likely become a pervasive resource.

And industry watchers say now may be the best time for online users. There are so many competing sites and services, and venture capitalists keep funding even more, that consumers can be choosy about the sites they visit. Most are free.

But as companies consolidate and the losers run out of money, consumers may be left with fewer, more expensive options. "We're going to look back on this time as sort of a golden age," says Barry Parr, director of consumer e-commerce research at International Data. "Right now everyone is competing for consumers' attention. In the longer term your choices will narrow."

(The Asian Wall Street Journal)