【脸谱网站每月用户超过10亿】

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收藏 2012-10-04

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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-19816709

Facebook now has more than one billion people using itevery month, the company has said.

【脸谱网站每月用户超过10亿】

The passing of the milestone was announced by founderMark Zuckerberg on US television on Thursday.

The company said that those billion users were to dateresponsible for 1.13 trillion "likes", 219 billion photos and 17billion location check-ins.

The site, which was launched in 2004, is now lookingtowards emerging markets to build its user base further.

"If you'rereading this: thank you for giving me and my little team the honor of servingyou," Mr Zuckerberg wrote in a status update.

"Helping abillion people connect is amazing, humbling and by far the thing I am mostproud of in my life."

Statistics released to coincide with the announcementrevealed there were now 600 million users accessing the site via a mobiledevice - up 48 million from 552 million in June this year.

Since its early beginnings at Harvard University,Facebook users have befriended each other【用户间结识】 140.3 billion times.

Sustained growth is seen as crucial if Facebook is tomaintain its value - the company has seen its share price drop to about $22(￡17) from a starting price of $38.

Investors will expect the company to look at ways to makemore from the users it already has as well as seeking to attract new users inareas of the world where it does not yet dominate.

"For Facebook the main challenge is not just to growin terms of numbers, but more importantly to deepen and enrich engagements," said Eden Zoller, principal analyst at techresearch firm Ovum.

TV chat show

Although the service is byfar the world's biggest social network, there are key areas, such as China andRussia, where local competitors still remain the online networking tool ofchoice.

Last month, Mr Zuckerberg visited Moscow, where he madehis first TV chat show appearance, as well as a highly publicised meeting withthe Prime Minister, Dmitry Medvedev.

It was a public-relations exercise designed to unsettleVKontakte - a network that boasts in excess of 300 million members, comparedwith Facebook's seven million, in the country.

In the same trip, Mr Zuckerberg made a"surprise" visit to one of the company's arranged hack-a-thons tomeet local developers.

Other trips include to China, where the company said itwas busy "watching and learning" from other internet firms.

Google, which launched in China in 2005, facedfierce criticism when it agreed to allow censorship of search results. It laterchanged its stance, and now directs all of its traffic through its HongKong-based site.

Success forFacebook in China would mean unseating RenRen (more than 30 million users) andpossibly the Twitter-like service Sina Weibo (more than 300 million users).

'Every phone'

In Africa, Facebook has targeted the use of basic phones- known widely as "feature phones" - which are unable to display thefull-featured site, but instead can use specially created variations of thenetwork.

Specifically, a project called Facebook for Every Phone,which was launched following the company's acquisition of feature-phonespecialists Snaptu, is central to its growth strategy in the region.

"Facebook is doing very well in Africa," saidErik Hersman, a Kenyan-based blogger.

"You even see people using it in the rural areas -often people will ask for a phone with Facebook on it, not caring/knowing aboutthe internet at all."

There are considerable monetisation opportunities too.The continent has, at a pace far outstripping the west, adopted mobile paymentsystems in huge numbers - more than 15 million in Kenya alone.

In developedmarkets, one path to better engagement with users could be through new featuresthat make use of Facebook's vast quantities of personal data about each of itsmembers.

In recent weeks, Facebook has been looking to monitor thereal-world effects of advertising on the platform.

These efforts are key if the company is to convincebusinesses that investing in the platform is not a waste of money - recentadmissions over "fake" users and have dented the site's credibility.

It has enlisted the help of US market research firmDatalogix to try to produce evidence that seeing an advert on Facebook -without necessarily clicking on it - is enough of an engagement to get peoplebuying products in shops.

Data 'goldmine'

However, this vast data bank is tricky to utilise,according to Ovum's Ms Zoller.

"There's no doubt that Facebook is sitting on apotential goldmine of customer data," she said.

"But that goldmine can also be a minefield. We knowthat Facebook, despite its claims to the contrary, constantly pushes theboundaries of what's seen as acceptable in regards to data privacy."

This goldminecould swell further. In the UK,ministers are said to be considering using Facebook, amongother services, to act as official identification for accessing public servicesonline.

Such advancementsare being noted by data regulators. In Europe in particular, Facebook has beenfaced with increased demands to tighten data privacy practices.

The company, which has based its European headquarters inIreland, was last month told by the Irish Data Protection Commissioner, BillyHawkes, that it must amend its Phototag feature - a tool powered by facialrecognition software.

Following an extensive audit, the commission also soughtextra assurances from Facebook over issues surrounding account deletion andtargeted advertising.

As it continues to innovate and evolve, the company wouldneed to get used to finding itself audited and investigated, said Ms Zoller.

"They're so high-profile," she said.

"They're a bit of a poster boy, but they could be awhipping boy if they're not careful."

Continue reading the main story

Evolution of a network

Facebook at one billion:

· Medianuser age: 22

· Topcountries (alphabetical order): Brazil, India, Indonesia, Mexico, United States

· Mobileusers: 600 million

At 500 million (July 2010):

· Medianuser age: 23

· Topcountries: Brazil, India, Indonesia, Mexico, United States