Facebook’s really taken off over the last year. It now has more than 34 million users and Yahoo supposedly offered $1 billion for the site last year. Part of its success is how simple Facebook makes it to stay in touch with friends, but the applications you add to your profile are a large part of it as well. Here are 5 you might like to try.
5) Scrabulous
A game of Scrabble in Facebook. It sounds strange but it’s actually a good idea; Scrabble is a game you play with friends and Facebook is a social site, so it works well, if you have enough friends.
4) Web Presence
Web Presence keeps track of your online identity. If you have a lot of profiles on other sites, or have blogs and write reviews, etc., Web Presence is an easy way to link them to your Facebook profile.
3) Causes
Causes makes supporting causes you care about very simple. You choose the causes and organisations you support and they’re displayed in your profile. It keeps track of the number of members and the money donated. You can make donations, which are processed securely and go directly to helping your chosen causes.
2) Where I’ve Been
A very useful app for anyone who travels, Where I’ve Been creates a map on your profile to show all the places you’ve visited; countries, states, etc. You can also mark places you want to visit.
1) Flixster
Flixster integrates the site of the same name and allows you to rate movies; your profile shows your favourites and you can collect trailers, show which films you want to see, etc. It also compares your ratings with your friends’, so you can see which movies you all like (or hate).
these dont sound useful to me.
CJ: Well, part of the success of Facebook is that different people get different things from it. Those are just some of the apps I’ve liked. If you have a few you’d suggest, feel free. 🙂
my fave fave app is astroclock. it’s fun to see heavens by the hour! the only problem is, often it doesn’t load!
i also love my daily wikipedia and astronomy picture of the day.
i actually love a whole of other apps, and i’m on the verge of getting rid of some! (really, i have too much!)
CJ: I’ll have to check out Astroclock – I could have used it for the eclipse yesterday! I use Countdown sometimes, which is a useful one as well; it counts down to any date you set (for me the release of Harry Potter 7!).
I think the thing with Facebook is it’s great for socializing and the apps are fun, but you can get lost if you use too many – you just get one long scrolling page. So I have a few core apps I use, and I swap the others around every week or so. It works for me. 😉
I’m rarely on Facebook since I don’t have any friends there. But, I have put apps on there that link back to other sites I participate in. Notably, I have the WordPress and Flixster apps on my profile.
CJ: I love the WordPress app as well; it’s so convenient. I’d love to see a WordPress widget here that links to Facebook, but maybe you’d need WP.org functionality for that.
I actually used Facebook privately for a long-time, so I’m only building up my friends list now as well. I used it as a homepage, with rss feeds, my latest podcasts. Facebook’s very flexible if you know what you’re doing. I love Flixster, btw – it’s never leaving my profile. 🙂
I adore Scrabulous, and have about 3 games on the go with friends and family. I find FaceBook excellent for keeping in touch with friends too.
Do you have any other recommendations?
CJ: Hi Alexandra, thanks for the comment. Scrabulous is a lot of fun and it’s the perfect match with Facebook – a social game for a social site! I like Hangman as well, which is good with friends. 😉
There are a few other apps I find useful. Email Me Instead is great; it installs a button for people to email you, instead of sending a message through Facebook. zuPort Flickr is a must if you have a Flickr account – it’ll show your pictures without having to import them into Facebook. Honesty Box is fun too, and I love Books; it’s like Flixster for books, showing reviews and ratings right on your profile. Let me know if you like them, or if you have any ideas. 🙂
Thanks for those tips, CJ, I’ll look them up, especially the books one. Ta muchly!
CJ: No worries. Hope you enjoy them. I might have to do a second list at some stage! 🙂