International

Today Facebook announced that it now has over 500 million registered users, an increase of some 100 million in the last five months, and of 400 million in the last two years. Mark Zuckerberg has already told us that it is "almost guaranteed" that the site will eventually reach a billion users, but with no indication of when he thinks that might happen.

The winners in the online marketing space have always been the fast movers. Quick and agile people who see an opportunity and have the motivation and resources to act rapidly. But as we’re seeing in the mobile marketplace right now, new opportunities are being fenced in by the biggest companies who control the platforms. In the evolving world of online advertising, the big beasts are making their presence felt.

Consider three data points:

As Facebook pushes to Win The Internet, its dazzling growth in usage is still to be reflected in profits, or even revenues. Accurate estimates of exactly what Facebook is bringing in are hard to come by but the best yet now comes from the Inside Facebook blog.

On Wednesday Spanish authorities announced the arrest of three alleged ringleaders behind the Mariposa botnet. Mariposa is possibly the largest botnet yet discovered and consisted of an estimated 12.7 million computers.

Twitter reasserted itself this week with the publication of two pieces of data designed to blow people's minds and a rumor that should send a little quiver of excitement up your leg (if you like that sort of thing).