It hasn't quite come to that - but there's no denying that social networking invitations are popping up with greater frequency, even in the business setting.
Which ones should we accept? Are there risks to participating? How do you say "no thanks" to a would-be friend or business connection?
Here are some basic guidelines:
* Just because you haven't heard of a social network, don't pooh-pooh it. Orkut, which is actually operated by Google, was the most-visited social network service (SNS) in Brazil and India in March 2008, according to Sarah Radwanick of Internet tracking firm comScore, Inc.
So if your business involves those countries, joining Orkut might make a lot of sense, especially if an overseas business contact invites you.
* Don't pay for a social network service. Almost all of the leading ones are free to join, and allow you to send free invitations. There may be some specialized professional networks that are worth paying for, but if you're looking for general business use, stick with the free ones because that's what everyone else is doing.
* Tell the truth and respect the protocols of the site. While it's fine for teenagers to lie outrageously about their hair colour and sexual preferences on sites such as Nexopia and Facebook, a business site deserves accuracy. If you're not comfortable giving out some requested information, just omit it, or put in your lawyer's contact information.
* If a site uses a "network of trust," make sure that you only invite people that you're actually willing to vouch for. Adding a scoundrel to your "trusted friends" network could be as bad as giving that person a glowing reference letter.
* Try to separate business and personal use. In March 2008, comScore reports that Facebook was the No. 1 SNS in Canada, so you probably want to be there. On the other hand, your clients and co-workers probably don't need to see vacation pictures or hear about your strange hobbies. Facebook provides a neat solution. Once you're signed up as an individual, you can create a "business page" for your company that doesn't refer to your personal information. Click on the "business" link at the bottom of the Facebook homepage to see how.
Aside from Facebook, the most common "add me to your network" requests that I get come from LinkedIn and hi5. LinkedIn is much more businesslike and the requests tend to be from professionals. You can use your expanding network to get introduced to that corporate honcho or influential politician.
Both of LinkedIn and hi5 send you an e-mail when you receive a new message. This at least partially alleviates the guilt that comes from forgetting to check the darn things often enough. LinkedIn also has a business-oriented "answers" section.
The questions there range from tiny and technical ("how do you delete a contact?") to big and business-y ("Have any of you ever faced foreclosure?") There are other answer sites, such as those run by Google and Yahoo, but LinkedIn boasts an upscale clientele so their answers may be worth reading.
Aside from Facebook and MySpace, most SNS systems have a long way to go in terms of building a presence in Canada. The March 2008 comScore data puts hi5 at No. 14 and LinkedIn at No. 40. Of course, this ranking is affected by the inclusion of popular sites such as the No. 2 Blogger (for blogs) and No. 8 Flickr (for photo sharing).
In social networking, quality probably trumps quantity anyway. Not to mention convenience. I already knew that a former student of mine is senior adviser to federal Environment Minister John Baird, but if I forgot this fact, LinkedIn would remind me and even give me his e-mail address.
Now for the thorny questions of netiquette. Suppose you get an invitation from someone and you have no idea who it is. It might be a Romanian spammer or your long-lost cousin.
Well, there's a blog for Facebook etiquette. On it, Miss Maz Hardey gives this stern admonition: "First and foremost, you never ask directly 'who are you?' That is the height of rudeness."
Instead, you are urged to probe gently, perhaps searching their list of friends and group memberships to tweak your memory.
What if you've scratched your head and just cannot remember the person? "Delete and go," advises Hardey. "That is the beauty of Facebook - you do not necessarily have to explain your actions and can tailor-make your social connections to include only those who are worth remembering after all!" Just hope it's not your boss's boss that you're ignoring. I have heard about a workplace harassment case in the Canadian civil service that arose from an online snubbing.
Facebook and its cousins also have some advantages over e-mail. We've all told a new contact, "I'll send you an e-mail," then the slip of paper gets lost or we just plain forget.
In my experience, people who say "I'll find you on Facebook" generally follow through with a friend request.
Another thing I've discovered is that young people who won't reply to e-mail often notice and reply to a message on their Facebook. They treat e-mail the way adults treat faxes, as something that was once urgent and important but is now more likely to contain annoying junk.
If having a bunch of social networks is overwhelming, you may want to consider downloading a free copy of Flock, which calls itself "the social web browser.”
It features a "People Sidebar" that automatically alerts you if one of your buddies has posted a photo on Flickr or Facebook, or burped up a "tweet" on Twitter.
That's a micro-blogging site, which carries mini-updates on people's lives, often on a minute-by-minute basis.
If you don't see the point of tweets, consider the plight of California graduate student James Karl Buck, who was arrested at an anti-government rally in Egypt on April 10. He managed to get onto Twitter from his cellphone, and hammer out the one word "Arrested.”
Sure enough, his friends mobilized to get him freed.
Now there's a social network that even a capo di tutti capi would appreciate.
(Tom Keenan is a professor at the University of Calgary and an expert on technology and its social implications. He can be reached at keenan@businessedge.ca)
