Web analytics firm Quantcast has recently published some usage statistics for operating systems, broken out into geographical regions. The company's data shows that 10.9 percent of online users in North America are using Mac OS X, an increase of nearly 30 percent over the past year.

Unlike determining market share by units sold, Qauntcast measures OS share by comparing the operating system of users via the company's "audience measurement services," similar to statistics gathered by Net Applications. Such usage patterns can give us a rough idea of the installed base of an OS among end users.

While Net Applications' data shows that Mac OS X has a global share of around 5 percent, Quantcast's data is broken down into geographical regions. Unsurprisingly, Mac OS X is doing exceptionally well in its home turf of North America. Though Windows still has a commanding share—86.8 percent—it has been steadily declining while Mac OS X has been steadily increasing. (The same is true globally, though, according to Net Applications.)

Around the world, Apple is also doing well in Oceania, with 8.6 percent market share, and Europe, with 4.7 percent. Though Europe lags Apple's global performance a bit, it's worth noting the company has recently broken into the top five PC vendors in both the UK and France recently, even as the market in Western Europe has been relatively flat. We expect Apple to gain some share in this region in 2010.

Mac OS X only accounts for about 2.5 percent of users in Asia. The two most populous countries in the world, China and India, have an even lower percentage overall—1.9 and 1.2 percent, respectively. Japan is likely responsible for the majority of Mac OS X share in that region.

Unsurprisingly, Apple is barely a blip on the radar in South America and Africa where the company effectively prices itself out of emerging markets. We doubt even the iPad could help Apple in these markets, which are still dominated by Windows according to Quantcast's data.

One interesting trend is that Snow Leopard has shot up to nearly 30 percent of the installed base of Mac OS X, though Leopard still has a little over half the base. Tiger has dropped to less than 20 percent of the overall base—expect more and more developers to drop support for 10.4 this year if they haven't already.

Another interesting trend that Quantcast identified is a huge increase in mobile browsing. Though mobile operating systems only account for about 1.3 percent of users in North America, the increase is 123.8 percent over the past year. That growth is largely due to Apple's iPhone and its Mobile Safari browser.