Do you think we will see the day when there are as many web sites on the Internet as there are people who use the Internet?

It’s an interesting question, especially in light of blog popularity around the world. Depending on the study you read, we might be almost a quarter of the way there. Those who frequent the web number somewhere between 1 billion and 1.5 billion, while the number of web sites is now believed to be a little over 231 million.

Yes, that’s right . . . 231 million web sites. You can read the survey of servers where that number comes from here.    KISS has contributed over 600 of them, but I laugh as I say that.  It’s a lot of work extending over 10+ years in business, but it doesn’t even rise to the level of statistically insignificant.

It’s the rate of growth that I find interesting, though.  Let’s start with 2003 = 10.6 million new sites; 2004 = 12.1 million; 2005 = 17.1 million; 2006 = 31.6 million; 2007 = 48.7 million; and then dipping to 2008 = 29.9 million.

Now, the drop in new sites over calendar year 2008 might be attributable to the world-wide economic downturn.  But, then again, the Internet simply might need to breath occasionally, and rate of growth goes through cycles.  After all, technology doesn’t necessarily advance in linear ways, and access to the Internet doesn’t necessarily maintain a steady growth, either.

It would seem, though, that both technology and access have converged in 2009 to sponsor an incredible pace.  Since the first of January, 2009, a whopping 46 million new web sites have been added to the Internet, many of them Chinese blogs.

So, a quarter of a billion web sites so far, and growing rapidly.  As the world’s economy finds its balance again over the next 18 – 24 months, it’s likely the rate of growth will pick up again.  This year might bring 100 million new sites online, and if the trend of five year cycles is a true representation of Internet growth, we’ll see that annual number climb for the next few years.

That would bring us to a half billion by 2012, if not sooner, and that’s a staggering number.  Imagine the competition for search engine rank position then.  In fact, what will search engines be like in 2012?  Will Google, for instance, have introduced algorithms to actually “understand” the copy on a site’s home page, rather than simply “recognize” the words it finds?  How will those 500 million sites adjust to the changing world of search engine functionality?

The World Wide Web is pretty big – - that’s the answer today.  But, it’s still just a kid, with a lot more growing to do.  That keeps things pretty interesting around here, for sure.