• February 12, 2009

Facebook's wildly popular "25 Things About Me" meme has helped fuel a traffic surge on the social network, according to Web measurement service Compete.

The Facebook note, which allows users to share personal details about themselves with friends, coincided with four times as many people (nearly 20 million in the U.S.) visiting the Notes section in January than usual. Nearly 30% of all Facebook visitors went to Notes. Average traffic overall grew 15% in January and 60% more profiles were created last month than in December.

Facebook has reported that almost 5 million notes were created by users just during the week of Jan. 26 through Feb. 2, more than double the number from the prior week and more than any other week to date.--Mark Walsh