LinkedIn seems to be the most useful tool to connect and do research on relationships between people and their networks. I have found it useful a couple times to connect with a contact that one or more of my close friends or network know but I had not had knowledge of. It is much easier to get a warm introduction or referral than doing a cold call.

It tends to be much more professional than the Facebooks or MySpaces of the world. Most members are 27+ crowd with professional experience using it for professional purposes or to keep in touch with past professional or professional friend networks.

We have also started using it for recruiting passive candidates for our employer clients. Although they typically do not post full resumes they do profile their expertise and experience. This makes it somewhat easy for a recruiter to search and contact candidates that are not really looking for a job but may be interested in exploring opportunities.

From a business development standpoint it is pretty good as well due to the ability to search for company contacts and or get warm intro's to those contacts by people within your own network. It's kind of based on the whole "seven degrees of separation" thing.

As for Facebook, it is a free-for-all right now. It is a very addictive site; kind of like watching a car wreck. People post their info, pictures of themselves and friends and then are able to message other, joining them as friends, posting pictures on their profile, notes, comments etc. Every time something changes you get an email to suck you back into the site and see what is going on.

From what I can see there are few controls on privacy and I see this as a big issue. If it is already not being thought about it will have to be. I can get all sorts of personal info including knowing what people did last night, who their friends are, pictures, etc. with ease. It is cool that it is soo open but I think it will become an issue as people encounter bad people using the site for bad purposes.

From my experience I thought it was cool at first to get contacted by people from my elementary and high school but it mainly it turned into people I really didn't want to connect with or hear from (except maybe for some of my old girlfriends...hehehe) contacting me constantly. Nothing but wasted time or trouble.... the under 20-27 crowd are addicted.

We have used Facebook to recruit lower level customer service positions like help desk or desk side support etc.

Jeff Nugent