Social Networking

I have to say, I like LinkedIn and Facebook more than MySpace, but they are all excellent examples of social networking sites. LinkedIn is geared towards professionals, and its privacy features are much more rigorous than at Facebook or MySpace. However, Facebook does have a number of privacy options.

While Facebook is not specifically designed for professional networking, I've used it in that manner quite effectively. Facebook has a huge number of Groups, including ones for professional organizations like American Library Association Members (ALA), Special Libraries Association (SLA) Member on Facebook, and Medical Library Association (MLA). This is yet another way for associations to reach out to members; posting news and events, connecting individual members, and so on. Many Facebook groups have open memberships, although some are restricted (such as school and university groups that require members to have a current email address from their domain).

LinkedIn has a much smaller number of Groups, and you must request to join any of them. They are completely targeted towards professional and alumni networking. Facebook groups, on the other hand, are totally random: from "Sunflowers Make Me Happy" to "Library 2.0 Interest Group."

Facebook can be used for work or fun... add Events posted by professional groups like MLA, connect with other members of your profession, play games, send "Gifts," find old classmates... Some useful Applications for librarians include WorldCat, Pubface (for searching PubMed directly from Facebook), and JSTOR Search.

Hundreds of libraries have created Facebook and MySpace pages: MySpace library pages tend to be designed for young adults while Facebook library pages are more organized, particularly since Facebook pages are all based on a standard template and MySpace pages are free-form. Considering that libraries of all types need to market their services to a younger audience in order to stay current and retain patrons, a Facebook and/or MySpace page is nearly a requirement, particularly for public and academic libraries.