This chart was published today via the Business Insider.  It just justifies and indicates how Facebook is so well positioned to become the first cloud OS based on Social Media.

It seems like it has been quiet since we heard that Facebook hit the 400M Mark in beginning of 2010. Well, they now are about to hit another amazing milestone… 700M! The Trajectory does not appear to be slowing down and they keep getting larger and larger. I followed the Trajectory, and it looks like the 1Billion mark will come around Q4, 2012. How will they keep this momentum going and get there?

Well, there is not a lack of news about the Middle East these days. China is a challenge as they grow their own competitors to Facebook….. so my gut tells me that the “Arab Spring movement” should be an important convergence that will be a continued asset for Facebook. How about South East Asia or the Africa region. This will require more and more strategies around mobile and possibly some acquisition targets for Facebook to keep getting users.

In any event, this is a big day for the Facebook team. A big congrats at getting to this next level.

Yesterday I got spammed by Shoppybag. Becareful everybody, they access your Gmail account and before you know it they start to invite all of your contacts.  We like to think of our friends as valuable relationships, so Shoppybag may expand rather quickly and virally with this spam technique, they really missed the point.

2010 set the stage for the daily offers. Many local clones have emerged and as Groupon fights to get into China, I have become a very active user of Groupon deals  at a local level; hyper local and hyper personal in my cities of Vancouver, BC and Brooklyn, NY.  My wife purchased 2 different Groupons for one of our favorite restaurants, and what I found interesting is that I found myself looking for Groupon’s of places I actually already go to and spend money at.  So what is the value to that restaurant if I would be going there anyway?  As we left the restaurant, we felt bit bad to get such a discount that we left a very large tip for the waitress.   What I did realize was that in both cases of using the Groupon, we actually brought a friend to the restaurant.  The value of making a new introduction and getting the word out clearly has over and beyond marketing value even though the restaurant lost 50% 2x for our visits.

So in my mind the real social element of not dealing with strangers that seems to be a strong point in the overall Groupon process, but to somehow bring friends into the equation is the best means of growing these social coupons in the future.  How can you not only get a discount, but influence others that normally would not have been introduced to that product or service find a way to bring it to their attention.

I started to advise for a company called WANTLET. What I like about their solution is that they are more focused on the Want Lists and the social graph of getting more and more involvement from your community rather then just focusing on the deals only.  They have been partnering with many of the coupon companies and aggregators, but they bring a unique value proposition of enlarging the marketing scope via social and viral introductions.

They are not at all competitive to Groupon, but they offer an alternative to social marketing platform that is something I find extremely powerful in the overall sales funnel process.

I think making the friend process more controlled and part of a users desire to spread the word is something that needs to be treated with the utmost of care.

Wantlet brings a unique new way to market; Social Want-Advertising.   Targeting users when they WANT to be marketed to rather then bringing automatic techniques to try to hit them in the face.  I think this  also speaks to the article I cited below.

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We have entered 2011 and I have to say the first decade did fly by rather quickly for us in the mobile industry.   I am a big fan of JWT and their things to watch deck.  I thought I would share it and highlight the top 10 in my mind for those realigning and creating a  mobile strategy this year.

Today, Facebook launched there latest implementation for web publishers that just “blew me off my chair”.  They have taken social to the next level by enabling publishers to leverage the social graph of Facebook to not only share articles, but to integrate this see seamlessly between both the users profile  on Facebook ( or news feed) and  the Publishers content page.

This was my experience with the connectivity with CNN.

1)  First of all, when I was as the CNN site,  I noticed the Facebook Share Widget.

2) So then I clicked “Facebook Connect” and went through the series of processes to Connect

….. Facebook Connect in Action….

3) I then had the option to sign-up for the CNN network…. which I did and become fully connected between Facebook and CNN.

4)  So lets take this for a ride….. I noticed I could go to the page within CNN to see all the articles recommended by Friends

5)  ….Then I found an interesting article on “Smell Sensors”.   I  ”commented” like and left a comment.

6) That comment was automatically posted to my Wall ( News Stream)