The amount of time viewers spent watching TV while at the same time cruising the Internet grew 34.5% last year to an average of 3.5 hours a month in 2009, up from 2.5 hours in 2008, according to a Nielsen Co. report released this week.

Nielsen says nearly 60% of TV viewers now use the Internet once a month while also watching TV — up 3% from a year before. The survey also notes that the number of people who are multitasking grew almost 5% from the year before to 134 million.

“The report seems to suggest that concerns by TV executives that the Internet was taking people away from their shows are unfounded. In fact, live TV viewing increased 1% in 2009. Add in time-shifted viewing a la TiVo, and the average number of hours jumped to a total of 163 hours a month watching TV in 2009, up from 160 hours in 2008.”

So what are people doing as they watch TV? A look the top 5 sites visited by these media multitaskers gives some clues:

Google
Yahoo
Facebook
MSN or Microsoft Bing
YouTube

But is multitasking really a good idea? … Sorry… just got a text… Right, CNN.com says heavy multitaskers are more easily distracted by irrelevant information than those who aren’t constantly in a multimedia frenzy, according to a study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Even when you think you’re doing several things at once, you’re more likely switching rapidly back and forth between them — actually compromising productivity. Plus, multitasking puts stress on your brain’s memory-retention center…

Wait, what was I doing?

I recently flew into the Indianapolis International Airport and noticed a sign “Happy Holidays: Free WiFi from Google.” Interested, I “googled” google to find out the scoop. Not only is Google giving away free WiFi at 47 airports across the country, but the company is matching donations to 3 charities along with the promotion. Good free service. Good PR.  Good cause. Great company.

Want to find out more about Google or this promotion.  Do what I did. “Google” Google or visit this shortcut…..http://www.freeholidaywifi.com.

I never cut class. I was never late and never left early. I paid attention. I took great notes and even taped many of the lectures to review later. But none of that made a difference. At the end of every lecture was a quiz that I routinely failed. I did lousy on the mid-term exam and squeaked by on the final to earn a D in the end. It was my worst grade in college and still today, I don’t get why because I’m still facinated by space — all the stories, photos and video grab my attention every day as I comb through news and information sites online, like today’s story from the BBC about how astronomers have discovered a rocky, Earth-like planet they’ve named dubbed Corot-7b outside our solar system that is as close to something like Earth anyone’s found so far.

The planet discovery is cool. The story was a good read. But how I found the story was the best.  I used Google’s new Fast Flip to thumb through online news sites, which is supposed to mirror old-school thumbing through a newspaper.