"Collectively, the time spent gathering and looking for information translates to an estimated. 5.4 billion lost hours per year for US corporations" -- it looks as if they are assuming that 100% of the time spent searching is wasted. That is, of course, ridiculous. People wouldn't keep searching if they weren't finding what they seek. Let's be reasonable and say HALF the time is wasted because of the other points you raised. That's 2.7 billion hours -- still an impressive number, but not so obviously a pseudo-statistic.