Blog Post week 5

Do you have an account on Facebook, LinkedIn, or Google +? Describe your experience and your reason for choosing the one you are discussing.  Do you use it for personal or professional or both?  Do you think librarians should have an account on any of these for professional reasons? Do you think libraries should have a presence on these? Why or why not?

I have a Facebook, LinkedIn and Google+ accounts and I use them all differently. I use LinkedIn for professional growth in both the educational and library worlds I use Facebook for personal social networks and I keep in touch with personal family and friends this way. I rarely use Google+, but use Google docs and other features for school. Each one has a distinct purpose in my life and I would not use one for all three purposes even if I could. I do not believe professional and personal networking should be mixed. Often times people have some people in their lives that make the inappropriate jokes or the person that is in everyone else's business. Personally, people can deal with that person but if it interfered with the professional world, employers could look at this with a less understanding eye. 

I think that librarians should be in social media because they need to understand the world their patrons are in. If the librarian does not understand LinkedIn, how are they to help patrons understand how to use it and why it is important in today's society. The librarian is supposed to be the facilitator of information and therefore they need to be in the know. Librarians need to not slander the library on their social networking sites and need to be responsible on the internet just as everyone else should be.