The number of social network users in five major Latin American countries (Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia and Mexico) more than doubled from Jan. '07 to to Jan. '08 - it was up 103 percent - according to an Analytics 2.0 analysis, using comScore data (via MarketingCharts).

During the same period, the number of US Hispanic and Puerto Rican social-network users increased 48 percent.

The main social networks of the five-country LatAm region, by number of users:

• Orkut - 12.9 million (up 27 percent from 10.1 million in '07)
• Sonico - 7.3 million (Sonico launched during the second half of '07)
• hi5 - 4.2 million (up 72 percent from 2.2 million in Jan. '07)
• MySpace - around 3 million (13 million users in all markets analyzed)
• Facebook - 2.2 million (up 4,152 percent from the Jan. '07 count of 52,000)

Social networks in Latin America have a regionalized presence, Analytics 2.0 notes:

• Orkut, for example, is popular in Brazil, but has no significant presence in the other countries.
• MySpace dominates the US Hispanic and Puerto Rican market, increasing 26 percent in the past year (Facebook grew 251 percent):
• Bebo and Friendster have minimal presence and are visited mostly by US Hispanics.

Other findings from the analysis:

• The number of internet users in the five major countries analyzed is approaching 46.3 million, a 16 percent increase from the 39.8 million in Jan. '07.
• The number of Puerto Rican and US Hispanic internet users has grown at the same rate, bringing the total to 66 million.
• Six in 10 of total internet users in the five major countries of the region are using one of the above-noted social networks, whereas 77 percent of internet users in Puerto Rico and the US Hispanic market are doing so.