Social media posts phenomenal growth

Facebook has called a press conference to discuss "enhanced, simpler" privacy controls.

Poll

Which social media sites do you use?

This poll ended on 31 August 2011.

Twitter

14%

Facebook

30%

LinkedIn

8%

YouTube

19%

Wikipedia

10%

MySpace

1%

Flickr

4%

Bebo

0%

Google Buzz

3%

Friends United

2%

StumbleUpon

0%

This is not a scientific poll. The results reflect only the opinions of those who chose to participate.

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IF you think big brother is watching your every move, he probably is, according to a leading online researcher, with Australia leading the world in social media engagement.

About 1.3 billion, or 74 per cent, of the world's internet surfers visit social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter, sites that often publicly reveal people's locations, activities and opinions.

The Nielsen Company's inaugural Asia Pacific (APAC) social media report analysed how often internet users - from Australia, Korea, Japan, India and China - visit social media sites.

The 74 per cent of the world's population that use social networking or blog sites spend an average of six hours a month doing so.

The report also found that social networking sites YouTube, Wikipedia and Facebook are three of the top seven online brands that people visit.

In APAC, the workplace is the most popular place to access social media, at 32 per cent, narrowly beating out the bedroom, on 31 per cent.

In Australia alone, just under 10 million individual visitors access Facebook.

"Its user growth is nothing short of staggering," the chief executive of Nielsen Online Japan, Charles Buchwalter, told a forum broadcast live via the internet.

"Australia has grown the most over the last 12 months.

"Australia leads the world in social media engagement, with the highest global average for time spent per month engaging with social media averaging over seven hours per month."

And although Facebook is leading the pack in popularity, experts predict Twitter will soon outrank it.

In Korea, Twitter grew by a staggering 1900 per cent in the year to May 2009.

LinkedIn is a site slated to see a dramatic rise in Australia during the next year after an increase of 99 per cent of targeted audience between July 2009 and May 2010.

While Virgin Mobile is tipped to top social media innovators during the same time.

In India, Bollywood sites rate the highest, closely followed by celebrity sites, while one in three internet users "tweet".

The report also found that most internet users in the Asia Pacific who share online content reviews rate them positively, except in China where 61 per cent of reviews are negative, compared to the average of 41 per cent.

Mark Higginson, director of digital insights for Australia, predicts a future trend of enabled mobility - or an even greater version of big brother - "with the internet knowing who and where you are and providing content and social connections wherever you are".

"Facebook is like a de facto currency."