One twelfth of global population now has a Facebook account

The company is expected to officially announce the half-billion milestone next week.

According to reports, Facebook plans to mark the achievement by launching "Facebook Stories".

Facebook Stories will consist of user-submitted accounts, describing how Facebook has changed their lives.

Users will be able to tell others how the platform has helped them change their lives by gaining a job or getting back in touch with long-lost friends.

Facebook marketing director Randi Zuckerberg said: “As we anticipated our 500 million milestone, we wanted to find a different way to announce and celebrate it. In the past, it’s been all about the numbers and milestones, and we realised we had never taken the opportunity to celebrate users.”

With the 500 million user milestone almost reached, the company is already setting its sights on getting one billion users by the end of next year.

Facebook has already made the platform more accessible across Asia by partnering with mobile service providers in countries such as India, to provide a low-bandwidth version of the platform for mobile phones.

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