Research from comScore has concluded that Indonesia is the planet’s most Twitter-addicted nation. According to the data, 20.8 percent of Indonesians online visited Twitter during June 2010, with the country scoring the highest percentage rate of Twitter usage amongst of any nation’s online population.

Indonesian isn’t the only Asian nation recognised as strong, from the continent Japan (5th with a 16.8% reach), Philippines (6th with a 14.8% reach), Singapore (9th with a 13.3%), South Korea (16th with a 9.3% reach), India (18th with a 8.0% reach) and Malaysia (19th with a 7.7% reach).

 

Asia Pacific is also credited as being the second fastest growing region with 243 percent growth and 25.1 million users visiting the social network, a growth figure bettered only by South America.

An analysis of the five major global regions revealed that Latin America experienced the strongest audience growth, surging 305 percent to 15.4 million users. Asia Pacific ranked as the second-fastest growing region, climbing 243 percent to 25.1 million visitors. The Middle-East Africa jumped 142 percent to 5 million visitors, while Europe soared 106 percent to 22.5 million visitors. North America, where Twitter has reached a higher maturity level than other regions, saw a growth of 22 percent to nearly 25 million visitors in June.

 

comScore did issue research on mobile Twitter usage however the data came from six European markets only, which is a disappointment as Asia – with its greater emphasis and reliance on mobile – may make for a more interesting and impactful study. We can hope more countries will be tracked for this data going forward.

But…

It is important to consider a number of factors which may have influenced the results of this research before analysing its significance.

- As is often the case with comScore research, websites visits from public computers – such as Internet cafes or access from mobile phones or PDAs – are not included in the data. This compromises the overall validity of the data as many of the newest internet-enabled people in developing markets like Asia and South America access through the mobile web, which has more than 300 million users in China, for example, though of course Twitter is blocked there. That said, many mobile Twitter users are likely to have logged into the site using fixed-line internet connections.

- The data includes traffic number to twitter.com alone and does not count usage of third party sites and applications. With many preferring to access Twitter through third parties, traffic to Twitter’s website does not reflect overall usage. However, assuming the data measures unique users, it seems likely a large proportion of Twitter users would visit the official site at least once in a month, therefore registering them in comScore’s data. So while this factor affects the data, it is likely to be less of a factor than not included public internet access.

- The report does not cover every country in the world, instead focusing on the 41 which are currently tracked by comScore. While it is unlikely any of the markets that lie off the comScore radar can rival many of the top ranked countries, it should be remembered that its data is from a restricted list of countries, though this does include the world’s most prominent digital markets.

Conclusion

This is not the first time Indonesia’s prolific use of Twitter has made headlines, earlier this year Sysomos found Indonesia to be Asia’s Twitter capital, although this accolade goes somewhat further and acknowledges Indonesians as the most addicted Twitter users in the world.

So what is it about Indonesia which makes the country Twitter-crazy?

Although the data does not include traffic from the mobile web, many of those who do tweet, particularly from a smartphone, are likely to have visited the mobile site and thus been included in the data collected. My thoughts on Twitter’s extraordinary growth, as told to Reuters earlier this year, are below:

With a population of 230 million plus, Indonesia is a huge potential market for social networking just in numbers alone. In Asia only China is larger and, given that Twitter is blocked for mainstream Chinese internet users, Indonesia has stepped into the void and become the Twitter capital of Asia.

On a global scale, Indonesia was recently measured the world’s sixth most vocal nation on Twitter behind a number of established western nations. There are a number of reasons for Twitter’s popularity, the number one factor is a low cost of entry to mobile internet. Available new for $500, BlackBerry is the country’s best selling and most affordable smartphone while, as a result of country’s mobile operators early introduction of technology, the Indonesia public has a vast array of affordable tariffs and services to support mobile internet browsing.

The fact that English – the main language of Twitter – is widely spoken is another key element while a growing fashion conscience in the country’s society propels the consumer demand for smartphones.