While developed markets are still trying to find ways to make Web 2.0 really pay off, it's actually the emerging markets that have already managed to successfully put innovative Web business models into practice. Unlike Facebook, Twitter, and MySpace who depend mostly on advertising to generate revenues, Asian social networking sites in emerging markets are already making serious money through additional models.

They've discovered that their users are happy to pay for content related to "emotion, status and entertainment" and the numbers are quite impressive: from virtual clothes to e-pets, Asians spend an estimated $5 billion a year on virtual purchases via websites such as Qzone (the leading Chinese social network), Cyworld in South Korea and mobile-phone based network Gree in Japan.  Qzone's Tencent Holdings made over $1 billion last year, with just 13 percent coming from advertising revenue.

It's definitely helped along by a massive increase in mobile phone adoption and mobile Internet usage in emerging markets. Keep in mind that Brazil, Russia, India and China (the top four emerging markets, (known as BRIC) combined are home to over 40 percent of the world's population and have an emerging middle class that will reach over 1 billion people by 2015. More than 1.7 billion mobile phone subscribers are expected to live in these four countries by 2012, and at least 680 million will have access to the mobile Internet – this means the rate of mobile Internet use in these markets will be similar to or might even exceed the rates seen in the U.S. and Western Europe.

These days, when looking for inventive ways to make money out of using new technologies, it's clearly vital to think "outside the box", but the answers may well already be there in emerging markets.