Facebook

I think the three most important points in Meredith Farkas' post about libraries on Facebook and MySpace are that libraries should put themselves where their customers are, that the library's presence should be more than just a picture of the building and a profile, and that libraries could educate young people and their parents about privacy issues. Brooklyn College Library and Hennepin County Library have presences on Facebook that are useful, and it would be nice if we could do something similar. I doubt that IT has the time to do this-- would this be a good, ongoing project for volunteers?

After saying all of that, though, I have to admit that I don't understand the appeal of sites like this. A face to face visit is best, then a phone call, then a nice, long letter that you can read and think about and then re-read. I just don't think that something like "hi, cute picture!" is real social networking.