Despite its relatively brief existence, you’d almost need to be holed-up in the farthest reaches of an unwired galaxy to be unaware of the phenomenon known to billions on this planet as “social networking.” Love it or hate it, there’s no denying its explosive growth and mushrooming influence. Facebook, with its more than 400 million active users—half of whom log on to the site daily and remain there for an average of more than 55 minutes—will celebrate only its sixth birthday next month. On its third birthday in 2007, Facebook boasted a mere 21 million active users spending an average of 20 minutes there each day. Talk about a colossal growth spurt.
Today, if Facebook were its own nation, it would be the world’s third most populous after China and India. Far from being for English-speaking users only, 70% of Facebook’s members live outside the U.S and rely on more than 70 available translations.
Social networking. People either swear by it, or swear at it. Either way, you can’t ignore the ability of online social networks to instantly touch the lives of massive amounts of people—around the globe—with more useful information and visual content delivered instantly than could ever be efficiently distributed via traditional paid media.
Users of Facebook post more than 60 million status updates each day; along with 3 billion photos and more than 5 billion items of content (web links, news stories, blog posts, notes, photo albums, etc.) each month. It’s both a visual feast and an entertaining way to keep abreast of friends, colleagues and acquaintances you might not otherwise communicate with nearly as often—if at all. New contacts are made and old friendships dusted-off as Facebook users connect with others outside their own social milieu and location, freeing them to form online communities around common interests, instead of just common geography.
Facebook is by no means the only social networking site to boast a massive worldwide audience. It is joined in that arena by scores of other specialized sites, including Twitter, YouTube and LinkedIn. Following January’s annual meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, global leaders launched their own secure online social network through which they can continue to convene, post new information; and collaborate among sub-groups formed at the meeting. Dubbed the World Electronic Community—or WELCOM—the forum’s exclusive online network has about 5,000 members.
