They're online a lot in the outback

Rugby, crocodiles, cricket, sharks, beaches, kangaroos, swimming, koalas, sun… Australia is the continent of sport and adventure, right? Well, maybe not. According to a recent survey, Australians now spend an extraordinary 80 percent of their waking hours surfing — the Web, not the waves.

Nielsen Online interviewed 2,000 Australians for its February Internet & Technology Report. Tony Marlow, Nielsen's Asia-Pacific research director, said that the company assumed a daily average of eight hours sleep, and found that of the remaining 112 hours a week, Australians spent 89.2 of them interacting with technology. "It may be more than that," Marlow told Monocle. "A lot of multi-tasking goes on — 61 percent reported watching television while they were online."

Because there are only 24 hours in a day, Marlow says that it will be increasingly difficult for Australians to do new things, or do more of the old ones. This is good news for countries tired of seeing the Aussies winning all those swimming medals at every Olympic Games.