The Internet is defined as the worldwide interconnection of individual networks operated by government, industry, academia, and private parties. Originally the Internet served to interconnect laboratories engaged in government research. Since 1994 it has expanded to serve billions of users and a multitude of purposes in all parts of the world. The Internet is changing all the time. Two things, in our opinion, were disruptive and directive in terms of the evolution of the Internet: the social web and mobile technology. These two innovations changed the way people use the Internet. In the social web, people found a new way to communicate. Since its creation in 2004, Facebook has grown into a worldwide network of more than 1 billion subscribers.Mobile technology has enabled Internet access at scale globally and driven new markets for supporting technology and market services globally.
Facebook announced on 19th Feb 2014 the purchase of Whatsapp in a $19 Billion Deal. It means $42 per WhatsApp user. WhatsApp was founded by two guys Brain Acton and Jam Koum in 2008, who spent combined 20 years doing geeky stuff at Yahoo! Inc. before starting WhatsApp. Founded in the heart of Silicon Valley, WhatsApp reportedly earned total revenues of about 20 million last year. With only 55 employees, WhatsApp’s $19-billion valuation could, in an alternate universe where each employee was given an equal share, fetch $350 million per employee. This is nearly five times what employees of Instagram would have got when that company was bought out for $1 billion in 2012. New Daily Record: 10B+ messages sent (inbound) and 17B+ messages rececived (outbound) by our users= 27 Billion messages handled in just 24 hours! Source: What made facebook like whatsApp, WhatsApp Extraordinary Growth in Users
WhatsApp is a cross-platform instant messaging service for smartphones that relies on the internet for the transmission of messages. As of April 2014, the mobile messenger has more than 500 million monthly active users worldwide and ranks as one of the most popular mobile social apps globally. Based on a low-cost subscription model, WhatsApp is a cheap alternative to carrier-billed text messaging via SMS, especially for international or group messaging. The mobile messaging app enables users to share text, image and video messages – the service handles more than 600 million photo and 64 billion overall messages every day. In the United States, the daily engagement rate among Android WhatsApp users was 36 percent. Recent market data indicates that the majority of WhatsApp users in the United States are aged between 25 and 34 years and that the app enjoys a strong U.S. Hispanic user base. Source : Statistics and facts about WhatsApp