Mary Meeker's 2019 Internet Trends: stalled growth, security dumpster-fires, more online education and fear of regulation

Every year, VC Mary Meeker (previously) publishes her must-read Internet Trends Report, which comes as a powerpoint deck with hundreds of slides (you can watch her power through them in 30 minutes flat at the Re-Code conference).

This year's topline trends:

* More than half the world is online so growth is slowing

* Ecommerce is still eroding brick-and-mortar retail

* Infosec is a dumpster-fire, with global political repercussions

* China and India each have more internet users than the US or Europe

* Internet ad growth is nosediving

* Programmatic rules internet ads

* User acquisition costs are climbing

* Freemium has moved from entertainment (where it is still strong) to business (where it's growing)

* TV is tanking, mobile video is rising, now beats TV

* Payment systems like Square are experiencing strong growth, serving businesses that were historically unable to accept electronic payments

* Gig working is growing

* Image-based communications (videos, photos) are growing at the expense of text-based communications

* Gaming is growing, as is game-streaming

* Businesses are collecting more data than ever

* "Data-plumbers" who provide back-end services for billing, account management, etc are a growth sector and key to the success of many larger businesses

* Customers are more privacy conscious but still willing to share their data in exchange for "personalized services"

* People are less happy with social media and how it affects their lives

* Encryption is growing

* Bad news sells better than good news

* Social media amplifies bad acts, bad news, bad feelings, bad beliefs

* Internet freedom is in global decline, balkanization ("splinternet") is one the rise

* Unemployment is a growing problem everywhere except the USA

* Online training and education is growing, driven in part by the mounting costs of traditional college

* Immigrants are key to US growth, with many successful tech businesses founded by first/second-gen immigrants

* Proportion of people in America born abroad is at a high-water mark not seen in a century

* US health insurance, costs, efficacy: a total dumpster-fire

* Big Tech is moving to hold Americans' health data and involve itself in their health decisions

* Chinese consumer confidence is in the toilet

* Chinese growth is in the toilet

* Chinese account balance is plummeting

* Chinese exports have leveled off

* Chinese mobile saturation is high, and mobile growth has ended

* Chinese mobile internet usage continues strong growth

* Chinese "super apps" are totally unlike anything used in the west

* Chinese education is migrating online

* So are Chinese government services

(via Copernican Shift) Read the rest