Virgin Atlantic president Sir Richard Branson has flagged the importance of social media channels, such as Facebook, during a media briefing in Hong Kong.
The stop, en route to Sydney, forms part of Branson's 'around the world in eight days' journey. The trip is aims to promote Virgin's new global connectivity, with the launch of Virgin Blue's new long-haul arm, V Australia.
During the briefing Branson said: "We take the Internet very seriously." He highlighted the fact that young people are increasingly using the Internet as a news channel, in favour of print publications, adding: "Things like Facebook are an essential part of many, many people's lives."
Branson didn't mention Twitter, where he has an account under the name richardbranson. Flight's real-time Twitter coverage of the Virgin round the world trip can be found here.
Here's a one minute video of Branson's views, filmed during the press conference, but the sound quality is quite weak so his comments are transcribed below.
"The Internet plays a more and more important role in everybody's lives. There are billions of young people who don't read newspapers anymore; I'm afraid to say for those newspapers [represented] here. They just get all their news on the Internet and therefore communication through the Internet is extremely important.
"Things like Facebook are an essential part of many, many peoples' lives. So, for me personally, I will write blogs occasionally and this trip around the world will be followed on the Internet. Obviously we want to publically state we take the Internet very seriously."
V Australia's inaugural Sydney-Los Angeles flight is scheduled for 27 February.
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