Executive summary

How much new information is created each year? Newly created information is stored in four physical media – print, film, magnetic and optical – and seen or heard in four information flows through electronic channels – telephone, radio and TV, and the Internet. This study of information storage and flows analyzes the year 2002 in order to estimate the annual size of the stock of new information recorded in storage media, and heard or seen each year in information flows. Where reliable data was available we have compared the 2002 findings to those of our 2000 study (which used 1999 data) in order to describe a few trends in the growth rate of information.