web stuff 4 writers

What is facebook?

facebook is another social networking website, which allows its members to keep in touch with their friends and associates. Membership was originally restricted to university and college students, but in late 2006, use of the site was opened up to pretty much anyone with an email address.

To give you some idea of the site’s popularity and reach, I’d suggest you check out the BBC news article, 15 reasons why facebook may be worth $15bn.

How writers can use facebook

It’s probably fair to say that facebook is a more ‘closed’ website than some of its social networking competitors (such as Bebo or MySpace). To see most of the information, you need to be a logged-in member. To see someone’s profile – depending on the privacy settings on their account – you may need to be listed as their friend. Unfortunately this means I can’t provide links to content.

Instead, I’m going to provide a list of ways that writers could use facebook, by taking advantage of the basic tools and applications that are available to you as soon as you become a member.

• Add relevant links to your user profile. Under contact details in the profile editor, you can add a link to your writing website or blog. You can also use the posted items application to let your friends know when you’ve written an entry or found a website that you want to share.
• Join one of the writing related groups. Search for ‘writing’ using the groups application gave me 500+ results.
• Start your own group. As an alternative to an email list, you might want to start a facebook group about your writing. Then you can send messages to all the members of the group, share related videos or photos, and join in any discussion on the group’s message board.
• Advertise your event. Whether you want to promote a performance of one of your plays or the launch of a new book, you can make it an ‘event’ for it on facebook. You may wish to allow your friends to invite their friends, which will get the word out to a much wider audience.

There are also a number of ‘add-on’ applications which may be of use to writers. I’ll cover these in a later entry, but in the mean time, if you’ve got any other suggestions about how writers can use facebook or any opinions about the service in general, please leave a comment below.

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