Facebook (and the like)

Ok, this is a fad that I’ve actually found to be useful.  Of course, it will only be useful as long as the fad lasts.

That’s right, I have a Facebook profile.  After getting a flood of emails from friends who had their own profiles, I decided to give it a go.

For those who don’t know, Facebook is a networking site.  You set up a page with a little about yourself, and then you start linking to your friends.  Then you can also see their friends.  Sometimes you’re connected with friends that you have lost contact with.  There’s more to it than that, for example, you also connect yourself to networks like your old school, or your workplace, etc.

It’s useful because our friends are putting up news about themselves, so it’s great to see where they’re at.  Of course, if your friends stop bothering, the site becomes useless.

So, if you know me, go ahead and make me a Facebook friend!  My profile is at www.facebook.com/p/Jim_Cottrill/518391432

Find out what this missionary says about Facebook and similar sites, and see a brief video that explains these kinds of applications.  Here’s another missionary’s love/hate relationship with Facebook.  And be sure to read this fascinating article about how teens are using sites like this – the article is called Kids say e-mail is, like, soooo dead (thanks to Lifehacker).  And here’s a useful site to find out if your friend is on any of a few networking sites.

Shari doesn’t have a Facebook profile yet, but we don’t think it will be long.

And by the way, I do have a MySpace profile as well (thanks to Perpetual Progress for giving me a way of hiding the horoscope junk).  It’s right here:  www.myspace.com/jcottrill

I haven’t used the MySpace one much, but there it is.

As with instant messaging, the trick is that everyone’s on a different network (for example MySpace, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc).  But the rush now is to perfect applications that can unite them all (as Trillian does with instant messaging).  If you have a lot of scattered friends you want to stay in touch with, this is worth keeping an eye on.

Meanwhile, just today another 100,000 people became Facebook users.  Mark and Dustin (Facebook founders) must be pleased.