Introduction Continued
If you intend to use it or not, it's a good idea to join social networking sites just to "grab" your name. Social networking is all about branding yourself and believe it or not, there are people out there who try to "grab" user names for a number of reasons. If they think it would benefit their cause to spread misinformation - or even sell it to you if you want it bad enough. But mostly because you don't know if you'll end up wanting to use the service or not and it's better to stick with one user name across all services to avoid confusion. This - and many other things with social media may seem narcissistic at first but there are other reasons. In social media it's common for users to refer to one another by user names with the "@" symbol in front of it. This is because, on Twitter - it's how you let someone know you are talking to them or want them specifically to see your post or comment. If the system sees your user name with the "@" symbol in front, it labels it as a "reply" which you can set up alerts for or get forwarded to your email. Many people (myself included) set up google alerts for their user names with the "@" symbol in front of it to see when it's used anywhere online. That way - if someone comments on a flickr image, blog comment, or just about any other form and refers to you - you'll know.
In addition to the major networks I listed yesterday, there are many other helper services that make it easy to integrate social networks' features. When I say many - I mean a TON and when I say easy to integrate there are some more usable than others. I don't claim to know the best ones out there and different people like different features, but I'll try to include the helper services that apply to the networks as I go over them.
I've got some great feedback after yesterday's post and thank everyone who contacted me.
As I suspected, my security contacts gladly share their user names to some networks but would rather not broadcast others. Most of us have networks we use for more of one side of our lives than the other and it's tricky to balance it all. For instance, I gladly share my LinkedIn info with anyone who wants it but I'm a lot more selective with Facebook. So don't be surprised if there's not a long list (or any) security related Facebook users listed after that section.
Facebook:
I consider this one of the most influential social networking sites out there. Facebook has the power to reunite people with friends from the past - or unite people that have never met in more ways than ever before. But, it also has the power to let people find you and possibly peek into your life from afar who you'd rather not have anything to do with.
The great thing about Facebook when it comes to security is that it's set up in specific "networks". There are basic networks for regional users - but it's the specific company and school networks that bring the feature to life. For instance, you can join the Harvard University network if you have a "Harvard.edu" email address and can answer an email to that address to prove it.
Information that you share can be filtered to a very specific level - so you can share more personal information with your specific corporate or academic network and basic information with your regional network. But even with all this filtering, it's a good idea to be careful not to post information that can be used against you, and since you have no control over what some people may do with images you post - even if they are your friends - try not to have licence plate numbers, house numbers or other sensitive info included.
A feature from Facebook that's replicated across the board with other social networking sites is the home page concept. When you go to your home page, you see all the activity from the people you have "friend-ed" (to be a "friend" both of you must agree to "friend" each other).
Although there are a lot of fluff-apps available for Facebook, you don't have to participate in them if you don't want to and no-one holds it against you. For instance - a friend may "throw a snowball" at you and you can have a "snowball fight" if you agree to install that specific "snowball fight" app to your profile. Most of it is harmless fun.
Another Facebook feature that is a key part of most other social networks is the status message. You can update your status message with whatever you are doing or want your friends to know, and they see it whenever they go to their home page or browse friend's status messages over a mobile device. You can update your status message from anywhere, which makes it an ideal way to broadcast information to people you care about. This used by some to broadcast every detail of their life, some constantly use it as a sales tool. I suggest posting status messages that you think people who care about you would enjoy knowing or should know.
Personally, Facebook bridges the gap for me and encompasses both my personal and professional life. It's the fastest way for me to share things I think are important with the people I care about and I can easily filter who can see what. My personal friends have to put up with my status messages updated about the security industry and my professional friends have to put up with updates about my son, but if any of them get tired of it they can "see less" of my status updates on their home pages. But you'd be surprised how many times professional contacts grab me after meetings or stop by to talk about personal topics (from what they have seen on one of my status messages). Or even personal friends who find the professional information they get useful at some point in their career. Take note if you are in the market to develop business: If you manage to post professional info on your status messages without your friends tuning you out - eventually they will run across need for your services or know someone who they'd like to refer you to. I don't have to tell you that personal references sometimes net the best business relationships.
If you are involved in higher education or even high school education, Facebook is a must. But one word of caution on this and all social media - no-one likes someone that uses social media as an obvious sales tool with no personal interactions. That could mean selling a product - or an idea - no matter how important that idea is to you. Take note if you try to keep students safe: If you are constantly using Facebook to preach safety and security to students - you won't get very far. But if you provide useful security information to the students (or staff members) like crime alerts or post useful articles that they can visit it can be extremely effective. In fact - students have even expressed to me that they'd use a Facebook app that would give them crime alerts and let them submit reports of suspicious activity through Facebook. This already exists for some institutions with varying degrees of success. (Spotcrime , GMP Updates )
Wish there was a way to hype up your cause or business on Facebook without pissing everyone off? There is - "Pages" and "Groups" are there to let you get the word out and offer other users the availability to subscribe to updates you post to the "Page" or "Group" so they get your real time updates that way.
In conclusion, I definitely suggest using Facebook. Just be careful about it and proceed slowly, finding how it will work best for you. There's no harm in building a network of both personal and professional clients as long as you are not trying to use it to convince anyone of anything.
Helper Services:
Since the Status Message is such an integral part of social networking, many Helper Services have sprung up to help you post to multiple networks from one place. For instance, if you use Facebook, Twitter and other networks and would like to use the same status message to update each, you can use a service like Ping.fm or HelloTxt,
You can even filter messages based on network groups you set up. That way if you've got networks you use for personal or professional reasons only - you can update status messages for each group separately.
