What are twitter and face book all about?

[Daisy]

I keep getting invites from lots of friends, family and acquaintances to join them on twitter and face-book etc. Do these community things not give away an awful lot of personal information to strangers should the choose to look at you on them. Also, why do people use them and for what purpose are the useful.

[Elwood Blues]

Doing on the internet what people used to via letters, post cards, etc. Since all info posted is in the public domain, caveat.

[Leif H]

They are a close proximity to chat rooms,but you give more details about yourself. Personally,I do not trust either. I tried building friendships on facebook and was labeled as being perverted or queer. I would like to know what I ever did to those who labeled me before getting to even know me. (

[koko]

People use them for bragging about themselves, boosting their own egos and generally try to make themselves more interesting than they actually are!!

[unknown]

You don't have to give away alot of personal information on them, the amount you give on facebook is your choice.

I can't say anything really about twitter as I don't use that site but as for facebook the best uses are for sharing photos with friends and keeping in contact with people when they are travelling or abroad in my view and so not easy to contact by other means. It is also possible to arrange events and things through facebook.

My personal advise is only give away the information you feel happy with and let people you are comfortable with see this information. There are plenty of ways of restricting what people can see so as long as your careful using facebook should not cause problems.

However one of the downsides of viewing other peoples profiles is you may occassionally view things your not happy with and find out things you would prefer to find out by other means.

[Helen]

You can choose exactly what information you give away on facebook, and who you give it to. Most people only share information with people they have chosen as their friends - strangers can't see anything except a name and a photo. You can choose not to be searchable at all by strangers if you like.

Twitter is a site where you share short messages with people about what you're doing at the moment. You don't have to use your real name or photo or give any information at all - you could keep it anonymous if you liked. It's entirely up to you how much information you share.

Facebook is for communication - I admit it is a little sad how much it is used these days, but it is useful for keeping in touch with people that you wouldn't talk to otherwise (if you see that as a good thing!) It is really easy to share things like photo albums, and to invite people to events, to play games, and to while away time when you should be doing something productive!

Twitter is more about expressing yourself and sharing your ideas - people enjoy summing up their day in a couple of sentences, sharing things that they're doing that they might never tell people about otherwise, and finding out what their friends are up to - yes, it's hugely unnecessary, but it is just a bit of fun really!

I agree that it is quite sad that facebook and twitter etc have started to replace more traditional forms of communication, but they are not at all dangerous like you might think (unless you use them very carelessly). They are just used for harmless fun and to keep in touch with friends.

[angel]

i belong to facebook. myspace is just dumb..don't do that. believe me. i did...and i quit. facebook is better...much better. it's just a community. personally, if you're young, i would stay out of it.

[Fireball]

public boards for private information. Dont mess with it. Use private phones and emails..

[JaysonPerman.com]

social networking

[RandomMacaroons]

to make it short and understandable:

twitter-
+ updating about your life in just 140 words.
+you get to update easily, with a phone or computer.
+It depends on how much info you wanna give out. you can set your account to private, and only people you allow can see your updates.

facebook-
+ sharing photos with your friends and family
+ playing games online and challenging your friends
+ updating people of your recent activities

Why-
+ twitter was once a source to entertain and just to update people. But now, it has also been used for businesses, and alerts. many celebs all over the world also use it to keep up with their fans. Even Obama has twitter if im not wrong!

+ facebook is not really just about updating with 140 words, it's also about posting pictures and stuff. im not too sure about facebook, but i hear that it's more for entertainment.