WAPO reports:

Blogs Draw a Blank, Mostly

It’s been the year (or so) of the blog, which is funny because most Americans say they are not familiar with the online sites.

That’s the conclusion of a new CNN-USA Today-Gallup poll, which found that nearly three-quarters of the public — 74 percent — is “not too” or “not at all” familiar with the sites. Blogs (short for “Web logs”) are online journals in which amateur, and sometimes, not-so-amateur, pundits discuss whatever is on their minds, from television shows to political candidates. The remainder of those polled were divided between those who said they were either “somewhat familiar” (19 percent) or “very familiar” (7 percent) with blogs.

Three percent of the respondents said they read blogs every day; 12 percent said they visit them at least a few times a month. Forty-eight percent said they never look at the sites, and 24 percent said they do not have access to the Internet.

NewDonkey thinks it’s telling that it’s only 3%:

But the overall degree of penetration at the moment should perhaps give pause to those who have made quasi-totalitarian claims about the collective importance of blogs and other internet-based political activity to politics in general, and to Democratic politics in particular.

…

While we can argue back and forth about who’s right and who’s wrong, and whose advice should be accepted or rejected, we’ll never be a majority party again if we forget about the 74% of Americans who don’t know a blog from a frog.

On the other hand, my reaction was: Three percent read blogs every day?! That is HUGE. That’s not an insignificant number. Twelve percent do so a few times a month?! That seems like an awful lot to me.

For every 100 people you meet on the streets, twelve have read a blog several times this month? And three do so every day. I would not have expected it to be so high.