social networking

All right, it lacks the gravity of April Fools Day or even Earth Hour.

But today has been proclaimed "Good People Day" by web wine celebrity, social media cheerleader and video blogger extraordinaire Gary Vaynerchuk.

Nothing can do justice to the idea better than his vividly exuberant video proclamation found on the page linked above. But the basic idea is to blog, Twitter, IM, wiki-post, videoblog, podcast or use some other form of social communcation to celebrate good people using the social web for good things--to help others, be kind to strangers, support worthy causes, perform public service, etc. more

Facebook has its share of problems -- its privacy features often have proven less than robust and its policies on censorship and sharing information with a third party have been ambiguous. But give Facebook credit: it's been remarkably good at listening to its users and making changes on the fly, especially when it screws up. more

A few weeks ago, Katie Couric asked the presidential candidates what one book (other than the Bible) they would take with them to the White House. Intriguingly, both Hillary Clinton and Rudy Guiliani named the Federalist Papers. more

Yesterday, tens of thousands of protesters gathered in Columbian cities and around the world to decry the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Columbia, a rebel group known as the FARC. According to NPR's Juan Forero, the group is currently holding 750 hostages. more

Jim Lehrer’s spot on your bookshelf may never overtake his place on the TV screen. But as the NewsHour host shares in a recent Washington Post Book World piece, he writes fiction every chance he gets, whenever and wherever inspiration strikes. more

J.D. Lasica, president of Social Media Group, blogged about an idea for Twitter (the popular micro-blogging service) posses yesterday on MediaShift's Idea Lab: reporters could use Twitter to begin a "mobile dialogue" with a few dozen interested readers as they researched and prepared articles. more

Welcome to Inside PBS.

This blog is part of a new site called PBS Engage, part of a larger effort to bring you closer to PBS and our first step into the world of online social media and community. In coming months, the site will be shaped by your voices. more