Friend | Jennifer M Eaton

Circuitmart recently ran an article about research that was just done on Social Networking. It focused on Twitter, and Facebook… not so much blogging, but the principles are similar. If you’d like to see the article, you can click on the link below, but I’ll summarize for you.

http://www.circuitmart.com/mart/49609.shtml (There is a 30 second commercial, followed by the 1 minute video presentation, or you can click “read more” to read the full article instead.)

What I found interesting is that they interviewed someone with 200 Facebook friends, and they asked them how many are really friends. The answer was only 30.

I thought about my own personal Facebook account. I actually know everyone I’ve friended. Yeah, to be honest, many of them are people I went to high school with, who I barely even knew back then, but I DO KNOW THEM.

(By the way, don’t try to “friend” Jennifer M Eaton on Facebook… that’s not me. Nope, I’m not a blonde.) You can find me under Jennifer M Eaton – Author. If you see Castillia’s fire in the profile picture, or an eye with the reflection of fire in it… that one’s me. (Wow, that eye looks creepy when it’s not cropped into a square. EEEK!

Anyway, I was thinking about how this relates to blogging. This is my professional area. Here, I have a lot of followers, but I’ve actually never met most of you.

Is that weird? Well, no… it’s not. That’s what social networking is all about.

Finding people who are seriously into writing is hard for most of us. I’m in a local writer’s group, but the people I’ve learned the most from are the people I interact with everyday on the internet. (I do get a lot out of small group writing workshops, though)

Through my connections on the internet, I find out about contests, seminars, training classes, resources, and I can get great advice anytime I need it, just by posting and asking for help. When I didn’t have my own blog, I jumped onto Nathan Brandsford’s… and that site is always there for me to get additional advice from a broader spectrum of writers.

Social networking has helped me tremendously. My novel wouldn’t be what it is today without it. I have “friends” all over the world to help me out. (The guy doing the art for my WEB Site is in Hungary… and he’s read my novel. How weird awesome is that?)

Used to its full potential, networking is a great tool. I don’t care if I haven’t met you. If you are here, you are my friend. Friends help each other out.

Friends cheer each other on.

Now, stop reading this insanely long post.

Get up off your butt and finish your novel.