I’ve been nosing around Facebook and Myspace for a few months now, trying to understand how these kinds of sites will influence the work of writers like myself. No terribly clear answers yet, but some interesting experiments underway. Facebook, for example, used to only have “profiles,” where people could create lists of friends and add various applications. Now they’ve made the site more flexible with “pages,” which can be opened by businesses or–in my case–individuals. The format allows me to create a page that’s a lot more like my own web site. It’s got information on my upcoming talks and my books. I hope to add other things soon, like video of talks, etc. I can send out notifications to people who sign up on the page to let them know what’s new.
So if you are on Facebook, check out the page, sign up if you like, and let me know what you think of it as it evolves.
Originally published January 2, 2008. Copyright 2008 Carl Zimmer.