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The Internet appears to be an increasingly popular medium for Canadians, who are spending less and less time with traditional radio and television.

Those latter two forms are seeing audience attention dwindling even though there's never been more choice than now.

"It's not as if TV is disappearing, it's just that the Internet is really consuming it," Adam Finkelstein of Montreal's McGill University told Â鶹ӰÊÓ on Tuesday.

He noted that many favourite radio and TV shows can now be accessed over the Internet.

Finkelstein was reacting to findings contained in a new study by the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission.

The CRTC's annual Broadcasting Policy Monitoring Report study was released on Tuesday. Among its findings, the report stated that the industry is continuing to expand and that new media is becoming more and more integral to Canadians' lives.

Whether they are accessing it through their desktop computers, laptops, cellphones or BlackBerrys, more Canadians than ever are using the Internet.

"This tool is always accessible. Twenty-four hours a day, it's there. You just got to get online," said Tom Liacas of Ethiquette.ca.

The report included the following findings:

• 70 per cent of Canadian households had Internet access, up six per cent from 2005, while high-speed Internet subscriptions went up from 51 per cent to 60 per cent in the same period;
• Though the numbers are down slightly, Canadians still watched an average of 27.6 hours of television per week in 2006, down from 28.1 the year before;
• They listened to 18.6 hours of radio per week, compared to 19.1 hours in 2005;
• In 2006, there were 1,252 different radio services available to Canadians, compared with 1,223 stations in 2005;
• There were 662 television services available in Canada in 2006.

While their share of audience time went down, revenues still went up for both radio and television.

TV stations in Canada pulled in $2.6 billion last year, up from $2.5 billion in 2005. Radio stations, meanwhile, reached $1.4 billion, an increase of $76 million from 2005.

Both radio and TV spent more on Canadian content last year than they did in 2005.

But the biggest changes affected new media.

"It's sort of this limitless playground of mundane to fascinating things to do," Finkelstein said of the Internet.

Growing numbers of Canadians said they listened to the radio and watched TV online, used a cellphone or an MP3 player or BlackBerry or other electronic device to access the Internet.

Advertisers are following consumers. The report found online advertising hit $1 billion in 2006, close to double the $562 million spent in online ads in 2005.

With a report from CTV's Genevieve Beauchemin