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The human population of Earth is estimated at just under 7 billion. (to be exact, the World Bank estimated our population at 6,973,738,433 in 2011.) 1 billion of these 7 billion humanoids are “actively” using Facebook. Wow.

In an interview with TODAY, Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Facebook ^[2], dropped the bombshell:

I mean, it’s just — an amazing honor. To be able to come into work every day and build things that help a billion people stay connected with the people they care about every month — that’s just unbelievable.

Now I know what you all must be thinking — the 1 billion number does not mean 1 billion people are regularly using Facebook, and Facebook has many fake accounts so the number is bloated. Too bad you all are wrong. The 1 billion number is of active Facebook users, people who use Facebook at least once a month. And that number does not include fake Facebook accounts, which are estimated to make up 8.7% of total Facebook users. So it really is 1 billion people.

Wow.

To put it into perspective, if Facebook was a country then it would be the third largest country in the world in terms of population, second only to China and India.

Wow.

Did I say wow already?

[via ArsTechnica ^[3]]