(This article was published in WO Magazine Fall 2010)
Facebook would be the third largest country in the world behind China and India if it were a country. It’s not, but it is a social, online community of more than 500 million users worldwide. Canada has the 7th largest population on Facebook.
A decade ago plenty of people said they’d never use email and not so long ago, text messaging was for teenagers. Today email is a given and millions of text messages are sent every day.
There’s a misconception that online networking and social media in general is for young people. According to Facebook, 38 percent of users are older than 35 and the number jumps to 61 percent if you include the over 25 crowd. The fastest growing demographic is women over the age of 55.
Still, many of the more mature set still don’t see why they’d want to be on Facebook. They’re not interested in sharing the minutiae of their lives. All the media attention lately about Facebook privacy issues has also scared a lot of people. You do have complete control over your privacy. The criticism is that some of your information is public by default forcing you have to set your privacy levels rather than the other way around.
Navigating Facebook can be really confusing at first but once you get used to friending, posting and liking you’ll find it’s a great way to keep in touch with friends and family and connect with other people who share your interests.
Start with setting up an account by going to www.facebook.com. You only have to supply your name and an active email address. Make sure you use an email that you can access because you will get a confirmation email to activate your account. You do have to fill in your date of birth to confirm you are at least 13. You can hide your age when you set up your profile.
Once you have an account, start by filling in your account settings, which is a tab at the top right. This is where you pick your user name to create a unique Facebook URL for you making it easier for people to find you. Your real name is what people see in your profile.
This is also where you select your privacy settings. You can restrict who sees your personal information, your wall, your photos and more.
Now click on the profile tab to open your “Wall”. This is where your friends can read and comment on your posts. At the top left you’ll see a spot for a picture and a link to edit your profile. You don’t have to fill in all of the fields, you can just add the information you’d like to share with friends. The more you share the easier it can be for people to find you. Upload a good photo because it’s what will displayed on your page. Some people like to change their profile pictures from time to time.
Now you’re ready for your first post and to begin finding your friends.
You have two areas where you can write: your Wall and your Newsfeed. Your Wall is the record of what you have posted and comments people have made in reply. This is what is visible to your friends when they visit your page. So, if you are friends with Sally she can see your wall but Sally’s friend Bob can’t unless he’s also a friend with you. Only you can see your Newsfeed, which is a compilation of all the information from your friends.
To post to your wall, write something in the field at the top of the page and click share. You can upload a photo or a video or add a link to a website. You can also post if you’re on your Newsfeed and it will show up on your Wall.
Use the search box on the top blue bar to find a friend or someone in your family, send out a friend request and your network is underway. You’re always notified and asked to confirm if someone wants to add you as a friend.
Finally, you’ve probably noticed that many business websites have a link to “Find Us on Facebook” . These are known as Fan pages set up by businesses and organizations or people with specific interests, like sports and music. When you ‘like” a page you’ll get updates in your Newsfeed. It’s a great way to stay on top of what’s happening and to meet new people who have the same interests as you. You can always “unlike” a page.
If you’re intrigued about the story behind Facebook you can catch the movie The Social Network coming out this fall.
(This article was published in WO Magazine Fall 2010)
Janice and Robin are two of the founding members of