From...

June 8, 1999
Web posted at: 12:02 p.m. EDT (1602 GMT)

by Nancy Dillon

(IDG) -- Americans spent less time on the Internet last week due to the Memorial Day holiday weekend, according to a report released Thursday by Nielsen/NetRatings, a joint service offered by New York-based Nielsen Media Research Inc. and NetRatings Inc. in Milpitas, Calif.

Overall surfing minutes fell by 18%, and the number of page views per session decreased by 20%, the report said. The population of households going online remained fairly stable at 42.2 million, compared to the previous week's 42.9 million.

"Clearly, it's an interesting dip. But coming at a holiday, the holiday is the natural thing you look at. Basically, it's more useful to look at the trend line over time,'' said Rich Coyle, vice president of corporate communications at Nielsen. He said the "time spent" and "page views per session" numbers have otherwise been "fairly flat" over the last month.

The numbers covered the week from Monday, May 24, through Sunday, May 30.

And although at least one analyst research firm -- namely Forrester Research Inc. in Cambridge, Mass. -- argues that Internet ad banners aren't very effective at driving site traffic, the Nielsen/NetRatings report did point to some successful ad banners.

The No. 1 clicked-on banner for the week was Treeloot.com's sweepstakes ad, which had a 9% clickrate.