Social Networking

Created on: December 9th, 2010
Posted on: December 9th, 2010

Time is running fast, I still remember about 15 yrs back when I traveled 25 Kms. just to see a computer bought by my friend, who got it from Russia, that was my first personal computer.

One of the most important thing that has changed in these years and specifically in last 5 years is how we interact and network socially. We were always taught how to meet and greet friends and relatives, how to interact with strangers, how to behave in a group, in a class, in a team, but we were never taught how to behave in a virtual environment. When you don't actually see and cannot read his facial expressions and voice modulations, its very tough to interpret and get the actual meaning from just words and also understand the hidden emotions and intentions in those words. With all these limitations of communication, tools like Facebook, linkedin and Orkut for social networking add additional complexity to effective communication. I think social networking, dos and don'ts is a very important topic to be taught at school for kids and teenagers. In this writeup, am trying to list Top 5 dos and donts for social networking websites like Facebook, if everyone of us can be slightly careful about these points we could surely use these tools for our best and prevent the cons attached with them.

1. Profile : All the fields on Facebook profile are not mandatory, try sharing minimum information, specially information like Date of Birth, address and phone number should be shared very carefully. For eg. you can avoid displaying year of birth by changing settings. You could also modify settings to hide specific information from strangers and share it only with your connections. Each word that you enter on your profile carries a meaning and talks about your character, your views and what kind of person you are, for a stranger that is the only source to understand you and make an opinion about you.

2. Photos: Facebook has made sharing pictures very simple and it helps in sharing your special moments with your friends and family, but hold on .. are you sure only your friends and family are the ones looking at those pictures. Change your profile settings to make sure that only your connections view them and not the strangers.
Picture speaks a thousand words, each picture you upload speak a lot about you, your life and what kind of person you are. Every picture you take is not meant to be shared on Facebook to everyone who is on your network. Few pictures are personal and are only for close friends and family members, those could be shared by other means like web albums (for eg picasa), emails etc.
Mobile uploads with distorted and blurred images makes your album less interesting for your connections, try avoiding them.
A comment on a picture is always useful for the viewer, not everyone in your connection could correctly identify Statue of Liberty, if you got a picture under it, comments would help them.

3. Status update: Its a very important piece, do you understand every update that you make on your account like uploading pictures, setting a status, updating profiles goes as a notification to all your connection. Each message you type in your status update would help others to make an opinion about you. Imagine you making fun of your boss/employer and your boss is on your connections. You need to be very careful using the status update if you feel uncomfortable sharing your opinion about a topic with each member of the group use private message instead.

I think a person always behaves differently in different groups, and there are very few topics which are generic that he could share with all groups, he should be careful in selecting those topics.
Also its very dangerous to show your negative emotions on status update, everyone under your connections might not understand them and might create an opinion about you or make fun of your updates. eg. Status update should not talk about your breakup with your girlfriend unless its meant to show your availability to other girls in your connections.

4. Wall post: When you post on a friend's wall, it could be seen by all his connections. Never post a humiliating statements that could make him uncomfortable within his group.
You might be very good friends but wall post is not the right place to make fun of him or share his personal information or details.
Wall post is also not a right place to share contact information, address, account numbers and discuss important information. You can use private messages instead.

5. Photo tagging: Its used to tag your friends in the pictures you have. If you tag a friend in a picture under your account, it would be visible to all his connections. Do not tag a personal picture of your friend which could make him uncomfortable within his group. Try taking his permission if you want to tag him or leave him an email or message when you tag him so that if he is not comfortable he could un-tag himself from the picture.