On this blog we try to understand and explain how the world has changed and is changing, with the goal of helping everyone – policy people, patients, clinicians, administrators, businesses – optimize for the world as it changes. Nowhere is that more apparent than in how social media is connecting us.

Two years ago Erik Qualmann (@equalmann), author of Socialnomics, blew millions of minds with a frenzied YouTube fact flurry, Social Media Revolution, then a 2010 update. Now this year’s version is out, with mellower music but no less impact.

Planners everywhere, please understand how important this is.

• If Facebook were a country it’d be the third largest – even though it’s banned in China.
• The 2009 edition noted that in 2008, 1 in 8 US marriages met online. (I met my wife on Match.com in 1999.)
  • This year’s edition says 1 in 5 couples meet online.
  • And 1 in 5 divorces are blamed on Facebook.
• 50% of UK mobile internet traffic is Facebook – “imagine what this means for bad customer experiences.” (I’d add: and for good ones!)
• Social gamers will buy $6 billion in virtual goods; US movie goers only buy $2.5 billion in real popcorn

A healthcare video in this genre, citing many Socialnomics figures, is this video by our friend Lucien Engelen (@Zorg20) of Radboud UMC (Dutch academic medical center) from his “Reshape 09” conference.

And for completeness, the original of this genre is the high-energy “Right here, right now!” video titled “Did You Know,” researched by Karl Fisch, Scott McLeod, and Jeff Brenman. It’s so good I’ll include it again:

Every conference should show one of these, so their audiences come away well informed about today’s world. If you need a shorter version of Socialnomics 2011, the 2:35 version is here.

p.s. Thanks to @Berci’s ScienceRoll blog for this. If you want to keep up on what’s cool, new, and useful in healthcare in 1-2 minutes a day, subscribe – it’s one short, valuable post a day. I wish I could do that!