Jennifer Dudley-Nicholson, The Courier-Mail | March 11, 2009

Latest research shows social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace are more popular than email with Australians spending one in every 10 minutes online.

Social Networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace are now more popular than personal email with Australians spending one in every 10 minutes online inside their "virtual homes", research shows.

And it is not just young internet users who are behind the trend.

The biggest surge in social networking was among 35 to 49-year-olds, while almost a quarter of Facebook users were over the age of 50.

Nielsen Online's Global Faces and Networked Places report, released yesterday, found the use of social networking and blogging sites in Australia jumped 4.9 per cent last year.

The report found three in every 10 internet users visited Facebook each month and spent an average of three hours on the social networking site.

However, Australia was still behind the global average for social network use.

Nielsen Online market research director Melanie Ingrey said the popularity of social sites showed no signs of stopping and would continue to spread in Australia this year.

"Not only is social networking experiencing rapid growth, it's evolving both in terms of a broader audience and new functionality," Ms Ingrey said.

Queensland University of Technology media and communications associate lecturer Angela Button said young social networking members were using the sites to form an identity online and preferred this communication to email, while older members were using the sites to stay connected with far-flung friends and family.

But the report also found that Facebook's huge growth hasn't been matched by a similar surge in advertising revenue.

In comparison, MySpace's slower growth but more entertainment and content-oriented offering has attracted more advertisers.

Social networks account for 10 per cent of all internet time worldwide, the report said, and the network with the biggest reach was Google-owned Orkut in Brazil.