The Nintendo Wii was the most searched for product by UK Internet shoppers during November. There were thirteen times as many UK Internet searches for ‘nintendo wii’ sending traffic to the Hitwise Shopping and Classifieds category as there were for ‘apple ipod’, and over twice as many searches for ‘wii’ as for both ‘ipod’ and ‘iphone’. Despite shortages of the popular console in the UK, the volume of searches for ‘nintendo wii’ has increased 158% since November 2006, while searches for ‘wii’ have increased by 278%.

There are many differing opinions as to the impact – positive or negative – of social networks on other sites, and a couple of recent examples provide some insight from either side of the fence. One positive side there was the news from Cadbury’s that it was re-introducing the Wispa bar following an online campaign. According to Pixelblog, over 14,000 people signed up to the various ‘bring back Wispa’ Facebook groups.