This marks the first time that more than half of the voting population used the Internet as part of the political process, said the Pew Research Center, a Washington D.S.-based think tank that oversees the project. In contrast, a poll taken just a year ago showed that 46% of Americans went online for political information and discussions.

President a major proponent of using the Internet, and Web 2.0 tools in particular, to communicate with potential voters -- and to let them communicate with his campaign. During his campaign for president, other politicians what it means to harness the power of the Web. The then-senator went beyond the somewhat static Web pages of most past campaigns and tapped the power of , blogs and discussion boards, to create a conversation with potential voters.

A lot of those efforts, whether from the Obama campaign or that of his Republican opponent to entice a lot of people to move their political attentions online. In fact, the report said that nearly one-fifth of the country's online users got political news on the Internet on a daily basis during the campaign, and 7% said they got online political news several times a day.

The Pew study also found that almost half of online users used five or more different types of online sites, including traditional media sites, as well as news portals, blogs and commentary sites, in last year's election.

But while Obama may have been using more Web 2.0 tools, the study found that a higher percentage of Republicans -- 83% -- used the Internet in some way during the last election process. About 76% of Democrats used the Internet. However, the online Democrats were more active in general, the study said, in posting comments, signing up to volunteer and making donations online, the study found.