[i]Facebook
DCL
Finally ready to join Facebook? The social networking site makes finding old high-school friends, college professors, and former coworkers more fun than any in-person reunion, while letting users post pictures and updates that keep them connected with family and friends. And though Facebook's setup is pretty intuitive, we've come up with five must-do tips for getting started without wasting energy.
1. Make yourself obvious.
The first thing you'll do is register your name?and unlike other social networks, the personalized privacy settings make using your real first and last name a standard procedure
2. Let Facebook search your email.
As part of the setup, Facebook will ask if you want it to compare users' emails against your address book and connect you with friends who are already registered. This takes only a few minutes, and saves you tons of searching time
3. Understand the homepage.
Don't spend too much time lost in the depths of Facebook: the front page shows you just about everything you need to know. Your friends' status updates are presented in chronological order; the Profile tab takes you directly to your own info; the Friends tab lets you search, invite, or add friends; and the Inbox tab shows messages sent to you privately. Down the right side of the page you'll find your friends' recent photo uploads, tags, and comments. Keep an eye on the Suggestions space above those updates?it showcases people you may know based on mutual friends or networks.
4. Avoid the time-wasters.
The internet is full of ways to kill time. On Facebook, procrastination takes the form of quizzes, lists, and requests from friends for everything from figuring out which celeb would play you in a movie to sending virtual shoes, bags, and martinis. Scoping out pictures of your high school classmates' babies is one thing, but no one really cares about your answers to chain-letter style quizzes like, "Which five items can you reach from where you are sitting?" and "Which color crayon are you?" When you take these and post the answers on your profile, the results are posted to everyone else's status update page as well--so skipping them saves you valuable time, and means your friends don't have to scroll through tons of clutter to find those baby pictures.
5. Use the site for good.
We've already covered some ways that Facebook can help your efforts to go green; joining groups like Trees Have Rights Too, Hotspex, or the Green Librarylets you lend your support to environmental causes, while adding applications for Village Green Energy and (lil) Green Patch means the company behind those programs will donate to eco-focused programs.
