Are you one of those types of people who posts something positive about your life on one social network site, then thirty minutes later rant about something else on another site? Do you post something irrational on one site and something professional on another? You may have bipolar social networking skills.

Not to worry, many users do it because people use different social network sites for different purposes. Such as Twitter is great to use for blasting out rants with 140 characters or less. It may be known to users that nearly anyone can read publicly made posts and anyone has the ability to subscribe to  posts via text message unless the user changes his or her privacy settings. Facebook on the other hand is great to share pictures with, connect with friends and family, and invite people to attend events. Then there is LinkedIn, which is the professional network that showcases accomplishments, current employment status, and other professional activities.

I’m guilty of having split personalities on various networks. Is it a good thing to keep certain aspects of everyday life on different sites? I believe doing so shows how dynamic my social network is because I’m not broadcasting the same exact message five times over five different social sites. It can get boring and redundant to see the same story posted on Facebook that was originally on Google+ or Twitter. But it depends on what my social networking goals are and how large my social connections are on each site. I may use one site for more photos, one for advice, and another for my silly and sarcastic posts. It really depends on what my purpose is for posting on one site over another.

You can find, then add me on these social networking sites and compare how I use them! Please be aware that each network has its share of different online personalities.

Google + – http://profiles.google.com/roger.renteria
Facebook – http://www.facebook.com/roger.renteria
LinkedIn – http://www.linkedin.com/in/rrenteria
Twitter – http://www.twitter.com/torridence

It appears that the bells are tolling, the organs are playing, and the funeral for MySpace may be imminent. Why is it that in three years this company went from being #1 on the internet to nearly becoming another member of the digital graveyard?

I believe MySpace was a social media pawn played by Microsoft and Google in an attempt to beat each other out with Facebook sitting in the middle benefitting handsomely from this crusade. Read the Tech Crunch article, “How MySpace Tom May Have Inadvertently Triggered The Google/Facebook War,” which supports my argument.

To return back on topic, MySpace used to be the place to be back in the heyday. I was persuaded to sign up for an account in the summer of 2004. Before going social, I kept my online friends limited mostly to my high school buddies and a popular music program forum.

The reason why MySpace lost ground was because it was nightmare to load pages and navigate. Users added several HTML and CSS modifications to their profiles that it essentially crashed internet browsers, not to mention the flashy backgrounds that made a disco party rather pleasant to view. When MySpace cleaned up their site and disabled many of their customizations, Facebook already beat them.

Not to knock them down, they did a great job courting musicians and major brands in a way that has been phenomenal. Plenty of bands promote and share their music through the site which they can incorporate visual aspects of their website into their MySpace page. Lately they have moved to “Social Entertainment” and leaving businesses to reach their customers using other forms of social media.

Has MySpace been edged out of social media stardom? Perhaps, especially if they have bowed to having a “Connect with Facebook” button on their front page.

Roger co-presented with Greg Koch on “The Benefits and Pitfalls of Social Networking Sites” at the Annual STC Summit in 2009 and a similarly titled presentation for the  STC webinar series in September 2010. At the time, Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, and LinkedIn were the social networks to use.