facebook 301 -- limiting your profile

as I make more and more friends on twitter and through my blog, I am getting more friend requests from people on facebook that I don't know "in real life." I've been pretty open with what I share on facebook, so I wanted a way to limit what some of my "friends" could see about me on facebook. here is what I have set up:

1. set up a group of the people that you want to limit
2. click "settings" on your facebook toolbar and click "privacy settings"
3. click "profile"
4. click "customize" for the items that you do not want the group to see
5. in the "who can see this" window that pops up, add the group name to the "except these people" section listed at the bottom
6. click "ok"
7. repeat steps 4-6 for all the items that you do not want the group to see

see how easy that was!

creating podcasts

my brother in law asked me last night about creating/distributing a podcast.   I twittered the question out and as usual, my twitter friends gave me some great responses!  here are the links that I got:

librarian and information science news -- podcasting section
youtube video on podcasting
podcasting for dummies book

TalkShoe.com -- an online community/service that helps you create podcasts

thanks to @michelletrent, @stephenk, @onegate, @dananner, @nikkimk and all my other great twitter friends for all the suggestions.  as I have said many times before, you guys ROCK!!

facebook 203 -- creating groups of friends

1. on your facebook page, click on friends on the top toolbar and then click on all friends.
2. you will then see a list of all your friends. click on make a new list on the left hand side.
3. give your list a descriptive name (i.e. waco friends, on-line friends, or family) and hit enter.
   
4. you can add friends to your list by either typing their name or click on select mulitiple friends to bring up all your friends and you can click on the ones you want to add to the group. once you have selected the friends you want to add, click on save list.
   
5. you can add or remove friends from your groups at any time by clicking on the group name.
6. to remove someone from a group, just click on the "X" to the right of their picture and current status. you will then have the option to remove them from the list or remove them from your friends all together.

groups are a helpful way to send information and invites out to only certain friends, you can also lock down your profile by using groups. more about that next week!

facebook 202 -- removing friends

it happens to all of us, sometimes we need to cut people out of our lives, so here is how to remove a friend that you have made on facebook:

1. click on "see all" on your friends section on the left-hand side of your facebook wall.
2. find the friend you want to remove and just click on the x for that person.

see, wasn't that easy just two steps!!

facebook 201 -- making friends

there are two ways to find and friend people on facebook.

1. you can search for people by typing their names in the search field in the upper left hand corner on your facebook screen. OR
   you can also search through the friends of your friend's by going to your friend's facebook page and click on "see all" under the friends section on the left hand side.
2. once you find the person that you want to be friends with on facebook, click on "add as friend" on the right hand side.
3. you can then click on "add a personal message" if you want to add a note with your friend request and then click on "add friend."
4. facebook will then send the person a message saying that you have requested to be their friend, and you will get a message once they accept you as a friend.

feel free to search for me and friend me on facebook. my name is caryn berger brown and if you put "it's all geek to me" in the message in your friend request, I will add you as a friend.

facebook 103 -- profile pictures

first I will walk you through how to change or set your facebook profile picture and then I will tell you my thoughts on choosing a pic for your profile picture.

1. log into facebook and go to your wall, when you are logged into facebook, you can go to your wall by clicking on your name on the facebook toolbar (by settings)
2. you will see your picture (or a white silhouette in a light blue box if you haven't uploaded a picture yet)
3. mouse over your picture and you will see a change picture link appear in the upper right hand corner
4. click on the change picture link
5. click on upload a picture
6. click on browse
7. select the picture on your computer to upload for your profile picture and click on open
   
8. your profile picture will then be added to your facebook profile
   

here are my thoughts on profile pics:

1. you need to have one, this is what people will see when they search for you on facebook
2. try to have one with only you or you and one other person in the picture, so that you are the focus of the picture
   
3. it will be easiest for people to verify that they know you if you have a clear and recent profile pic
4. if you have multiple social media accounts (twitter, blog, facebook, etc), it is best to use the same profile picture across all of them

hope you are enjoying learning about facebook, keep the comments coming!

facebook 102 -- answers to your questions

after my facebook 101 post, I got some really good questions and comments. I decided to add an extra post to address those.

why are you on facebook?
at first, I joined facebook because my hubby was on there, and he had found some good friends of ours that had moved away from waco on facebook. I wanted to reconnect with them as well. once I was on it, I was hooked. I use it as an easy way to share pictures with my friends, to keep up with new friends, and to reconnect with friends from high school or my hometown. I have also started using it to create deeper friendships with people that I have become friends with on twitter.

what is a wall?
every person on facebook has a section of their facebook profile that is called a wall. the wall is where your status updates show up, where your friends can write notes to you, where the pictures that you have posted, and gifts you have received on facebook will show up.


what do the different privacy settings mean?
in my facebook 101 post, I walked you through how to change your privacy settings. below is an explanation of what the different settings are:

my network and friends -- people that you have accepted as friends and people in your network can see

friends of friends -- people that you have accepted as friends and the people that they have accepted as friend can see

only friends -- only the people that you have accepted as friends can see

no one -- no one can see


thanks for all the comments, keep them coming!! I will have a new post up on sunday on profile pictures!