Communication and information: alternative uses of the Internet in households

The Internet has been characterized as a superhighway to information and as a high-tech extension of the home telephone. How are people really using the Internet? The history of previous technologies that support interpersonal communication suggests that communication may be a more important use and determinant of participants’ commitment to the Internet than is information acquisition and entertainment. Operationalizing interpersonal communication as the use of electronic mail and information acquisition and entertainment as the use of the World Wide Web, we analyzed longitudinal data from a field trial of 229 individuals in 110 households during their first year on the Internet. The results show that interpersonal communication is a stronger driver of Internet use than are information and entertainment applications.