Actually, quite a bit so far.

There is a lot of hype around Facebook. I too joined the party a wee while ago, just as its user numbers started to explode phenomenally. I have been researching Facebook for much longer since I needed to gather information on it’s relevance for business use. It has it’s business place, but that’s another post.

Today I want to share a few bits of what Facebook has done for me personally since I signed up:

A truly World Wide Web

Facebook is awesome to catch up with friends far away. My network right now is mostly with friends that live all over the show. Norway, Canada, South Africa, Belgium, Austria, The United States, Costa Rica… It is really nice being in touch with friends that I haven’t seen in a while and I love getting a glimpse at what they are doing right now.

A picture is a thousand words

Many of my friends post photos of themselves, or experiences that means something to them. And some of the pictures are also scenes from my life. Like my buddy Bella: she posted some photos from our time together on the South Island of New Zealand last year, when we worked on 10,000 BC. There is an awesome photo of Mr. Emmerich in the snow on her Facebook photo album. It was really nice to see someone else’s impressions on a shared experience.

It is of course always nice to see what moves my friends far away right now and how their world looks like. And I cannot help but be intrigued with how people choose to represent themselves on Facebook (but that once again is the media studies researcher in me – another post shall explore this).

Expanding my circle of friends

Of course: the whole point of Social Networking! The expansion of my social network online is happening in several ways:

- Friends look me up and add me as their friends

- Friends of friends who are also my friends look me up to add me

- I seek out friends or invite them

- People I do not know personally but whom I find interesting from reading their blogs et. al. are adding those who ask to their list of friends (like Robert Scoble announced today), and I take them up on their generous offer.

I must say that I have found Facebook to be great tool for both getting and keeping in touch with one another, and expanding and maintaining a circle of friends and associates. As my friend Alex stated when I added her: “you fell into the facebook trap too eh?” Well, I did. And so far I like it.

So, who else wants to be my friend on Facebook? Sign up, look me up, add me. Expand those networks!