A decade after the Internet began its transformation from a tool for college professors and students to the new form of mass communication, its usage is percolating more deeply even into rural areas such as the South Coast community, according to a newspaper marketing director for the parent company of The World.

Wider Internet awareness and usage was the theme of the forum "Making the Internet Work for You," sponsored by The World and held Tuesday morning at the Red Lion Hotel in Coos Bay.

During the one-hour seminar, Charles Kolsky, vice president of marketing research and electronic media for Pulitzer Newspapers Inc., described the increasing reach of the online world in Coos County and its potential to give merchants a broad new channel to advertise themselves even to an aging population. (Pulitzer is the owner of Southwestern Oregon Publishing, which operates The World, the Bandon Western World, The Umpqua Post of Reedsport and their Web sites.)

Kolsky's presentation, based on a four-month study last year by KPC Research, studied the makeup of the Coos County population, its online activity and its shopping patterns.

The picture of the community painted by U.S. Census records is not the younger, wealthier one usually associated with heavy online use. Kolsky pointed to a community with the sixth-oldest median age in Oregon (45 years) and a median income about $11,000 below the statewide figure of $45,196. But even that population, he quickly added, is growing comfortable with the Internet as an everyday tool, enough to become good targets for virtual advertising.

The KPC study indicated some 64 percent of Coos County residents have Internet access at home and 22 can go online in the workplace.

Moreover, the Internet-using portion of the South Coast community includes a much greater share of college-educated and higher-income people. Four of 10 residents who go online have a household income above $50,000 and another four out of 10 possess at least a bachelor's degree, the research data indicated.

Overall, 86 percent of residents, about 32,100 people, had used the Internet in the last 30 days of the study, including at least 82 percent of all adult age groups.

Some 50 audience members attended the event, which covered the ways business owners, real estate brokers and employers can extend their reach and visibility through online advertising.