An interesting report was released yesterday by Opera Software saying that while Twitter did grow their user base across the world in 2009, they experienced a negative growth rate in the United States.

The “State of the Mobile Web” report for January 2010 reflected back on December 2009 as well as the entire past year. The report found that Facebook and Twitter indeed did grow their user bases the fastest in 2009 on a global level.

However, in the United States, Twitter experienced a negative growth rate in 2009 (users), while both Facebook and MySpace saw impressive gains. Facebook did particularly well, growing 194% in 2009.

Obviously, Twitter users located in the United States cannot be too happy with the results that are presented in the report. However, they should be encouraged with the impressive gains that Twitter made in the United Kingdom. Twitter experienced a 595% growth rate in the United Kingdom last year.

Can we really draw any conclusions from these numbers? It’s clear that Twitter is doing well in the United Kingdom and Facebook is doing well in the United States, but as other social networking sites enter the fold in 2010 and beyond, it will be interesting to see where the numbers shift. As social networking as a whole continues to expand and change our daily lives, firmer conclusions can likely be set in future years.

What are your thoughts on the report?

Thanks to TechCrunch for providing the report. A copy of the report can be accessed here.

(Photo Credit: Penn Olson)