Social Portrait Of Online Media Audience: Changing Trends and Preferences among Russians

Social Portrait of Online Media Audience: Changing Trends and Preferences among Russians

OLEG M. BARBAKOV¹, MARINA V. VINOGRADOVA² & ALEXANDER A. SHATSKY³
¹Tyumen Industrial University, Russian Federation
^2,3Russian State Social University, Russian Federation

Abstract
The rapid spreading of the Internet and virtual ways of communication actualizes the issue of compiling a sociological portrait of online mass media audience. The study examined the socio-demographic composition of online media audience in Russia in the dynamics over the last ten years from 2008 to 2018. The analysis of empirical data on the main classification characteristics allowed identifying the stable trends in the changes in the Internet audience and their preferences. We found that Internet users often do not use news websites directly (35 per cent of the entire audience); most of all, they are interested in the most aggregated overview or a specific piece of news. Every year, the online media audience increasingly differentiates and becomes more diverse by sex, age, occupation and other characteristics. A significant number of Internet users consists of Russian residents at the age of 25 to 34 years (29 per cent). The elder generation has begun to use the Internet more often (21 per cent), while the other two age groups of the audience at the age of 12-17 years and 18-24 years are the smallest ones, accounting for 10 per cent and 14 per cent respectively. The main companies that significantly affect the public mood in the country are Yandex and Mail.ru; they control over 75 per cent of the market. The article provides an assessment of consumers’ readiness to perceive the online media as the main and only source of information.

Keywords: Mass media, social portrait, Internet audience

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Dr. Oleg M. Barbakov is a professor and head of the Department of Business Informatics and Mathematics at Tyumen Industrial University, Russian Federation. His areas of scientific interest are: information technologies, information systems, data mining, large data, system analysis, information management, sociology of management, business analytics.
Dr. Marina V. Vinogradova is a professor and director of Research Institute of Advanced Directions and Technologies at Russian State Social University, Russian Federation. Her areas of scientific interest are socio-economic development of macro and microsystems, socio-cultural problems, forecasting, information systems.

Alexander A. Shatsky is an applicant for candidate degree in economics, Russian State Social University, Russian Federation. His areas of scientific interest are: socio-economic development, multi-agent technologies, digital economy, management of economic systems, service management.