Читать книгу Facebook For Dummies - Carolyn Abram - Страница 11

“Yes,” you’re saying. “I know Facebook is going to help me stay in touch with my friends and communicate with the people in my life, but what is it?”

Well, at its most basic, Facebook is a website. You’ll find it through a web browser such as Safari, Google Chrome, or Firefox, the same way you might navigate to a search engine like Google or to an airline’s website to book tickets. (You can also access it using an app on your smartphone or tablet, but more on Facebook Mobile in Chapter 7.) Figure 1-1 shows what you will probably see when you navigate to www.facebook.com.

FIGURE 1-1: Welcome to Facebook.

If you’re already a Facebook user and choose to stay logged in to your computer, www.facebook.com will likely look more like Figure 1-2, which shows an example of your News Feed and Home page.

FIGURE 1-2: Welcome back to Facebook, old friend.

Facebook is a website where you go to connect and share with friends. And just as there are a lot of different ways you interact with friends in the real world, there are a lot of ways to do so on Facebook. For example, you may go to Facebook to

 Check out what your friends are up to today.

 Read articles and other news that your friends have posted.

 Tell your friends and family about your recent successes, show them your photos, or let them know you’re thinking of them.

 Share a tidbit from your day, something you’ve been thinking about, or an article you found interesting.

 Show off the pictures from your latest vacation.

 Share a live video of a concert, an event, or whatever is going on right now.

 Make a contact in a city you’re moving to or at a company where you’re applying for a job.

 Plan an event.

 Get in touch with an old friend.

 Garner support for a cause.

 Buy or sell used items.

 Get recommendations from friends for movies, books, music, and restaurants.

 Create a special dating profile and find a date.

 Remember everyone’s birthday.

So what Facebook is, exactly, is a website built to help you represent yourself online and share with your real-world friends online. The rest of it — how that’s accomplished, what people typically share on Facebook, and how it all works — is what this book is all about.