WASHINGTON—According to a study published Monday by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, for every person who reads, listens to, or watches some form of media on the internet, there are approximately 2,000 individuals engaged in creating new online content. “In terms of web-based entertainment, journalism, and personal opinion pieces, creators now outnumber consumers by a factor of several hundred thousand percent—meaning that for every one viewer, there are dozens of fully staffed companies churning out articles, videos, blogs, vlogs, and countless social media posts hoping to lure that person to click,” said bureau commissioner Erica Groshen, adding that during each minute of online video streamed by a consumer, another whole lifetime’s worth of video content is uploaded. “Furthermore, our analysis found that the massive increase in internet usage over the past two decades was due almost entirely to people going online to publish text or images they themselves had produced and then repeatedly hitting the refresh button to see if anyone else has looked at their work.” Reports later confirmed that the six people who worked on this article are the only ones currently reading it.

Advertisement