from the Chicago sun Times
North suburbs lead computer wave
December 7, 1998
BY MARK SKERTIC SUBURBAN REPORTER
Digitally speaking, the northern suburbs and Chicago's North Side are
the area's most popular places for surfing, as Internet use here
continues to grow with no slowdown in sight.
A new study ranks Lincoln Park as the most wired city neighborhood and
Evanston as the suburb with that distinction. Both were helped by the
presence of universities that provide easy Internet access to students
and faculty.
A new study by Internet provider InterAccess found that almost without
exception, the areas with the most Internet connections are north. The
western suburbs of Oak Brook and Wheaton were the only non-northern
communities to crack the top 10.
About half of Chicago area homes have computers, and 24.7 percent of
the population is online at home, work or school, according to
analysis by Forrester Research Inc.
InterAccess attempted to measure where the greatest growth is. It's
being fueled by people such as Lincoln Park resident Adam Sichol, a
financial analyst whose work depends on data he pulls off the Web. At
home, the Net helps the native New Yorker keep in touch with friends
and read local newspapers back home.
``I realize how much of a time-saver and a lifesaver it can be,'' he
said. ``I can picture life without the Internet, but I know how much
simpler it is with it.''
Signing on to the Internet for information or communicating via e-mail
has gone from a novelty to a part of life for many, said Hoyt Hudson,
InterAccess vice president of technology. ``Things have changed; we
don't have to sell people on the Internet,'' he said.
His company ranked neighborhood and suburban Internet use by combining
its own subscriber lists with what it knew about its competitors,
information gathered from its Web site and demographic data the
company purchased. ``We merged them into a composite rating so we can
attach a rank to each,'' Hudson said.
Suburban leader Evanston is the first community locally to announce
plans to become a ``wired city.'' City leaders envision a day when
residents, businesses and government all are plugged into the same
network. Applying for permits or calling up a child's homework
assignment would take just a few mouse clicks.
``We believe the future of commerce is not in building factories or
even as many office buildings,'' City Manager Roger Crum said. ``This
is not making room for an industrial base--it's making room for an
intellectual base.'' Ultimately, jumping onto the Internet would be as
natural for residents as picking up the telephone.
In many households, that move already is taking place. In Tanya
Aynessazian's Grayslake home, that glowing box she's in front of in
the evening isn't her television. Net surfing has replaced ``Must See
TV.''
Her 4-year-old daughter likes to visit places for kids, such as the
Nickelodeon site. Her husband tracks statistics for his fantasy
football team. This year, Aynessazian will do holiday shopping with
major retailers without leaving home.
``You get to look at everything they have, but you don't have people
saying, `Buy this! Buy this!' '' she said.
Aynessazian, 30, uses the Internet in her job in marketing research.
But it was when she was home on maternity leave that she took up
surfing. ``It was the only link I had to people,'' she said. ``Then
when the baby was born, we e-mailed his 2-day-old pictures across the
country.''
National estimates of how many people are using the Internet vary. A
study this summer estimated that 70.5 million--about a third of the
nation's population--are online. Almost half of those ages 16 to 34
were using the Internet, the study by Nielsen Media Research
estimated.
Earlier this year, Yahoo! Internet Life magazine ranked Chicago ninth
among wired big cities--based in part on the number of households and
businesses online.
Chicago was among the nation's leaders in national ``backbone''
traffic, trailing only Washington, D.C., in the measure of raw data
passing through a location. The reason is the same one that made
Chicago a major transportation hub--its central location means
billions of bits of data pass through here daily en route from one
part of the country to another.
Yahoo! cited a study that showed about 17.7 percent of Chicago's
population is using the Internet. San Francisco was the leader, with
26.3 percent online.
``Smack in the middle of the nation, Chicago is a vital way station
for Net data but lags when it comes to Net businesses,'' Yahoo!
concluded.
InterAccess' Hudson doesn't see Internet growth leveling off anytime
soon. Efforts to boost the speed of Internet connections will continue
to fuel growth, he said.
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