Posted on 15 June 2009

So today, as advised by mashable, I signed up for three new social media sites. Actually, they’re not really social media sites so much as they are social media aggregates/search engine optimizers: Google profiles, chi.mp, and retaggr. These are touted as nice, easy ways to get all your social media information in one place– I especially like chi.mp’s ability to pull in full feeds from multiple places in a reverse timeline, though retaggr’s embeddable card may be useful at some point, too.

What really gets me is the amout of options there are. I’m trying to get online in a proactive way, but at the same time I really don’t want to be managing hundreds of accounts, aggregating tools or no. So my question to you, my three readers, is this: which social media sites are essential (inasmuch as a social media site can be)?

Sites I use:

Facebook: like it or not, this one is pretty much the macdaddy these days, and is an essential component of any online identity, personal, professional, or corporate.

LinkedIn: like Facebook, but without zombie attacks. This is where you connect with your CEO.

Twitter: better than Facebook for networking, since it eliminates need for friend requests. I can see this one either becoming king or disappearing altogether. Right now it’s near-essential, though.

Delicious: This is an awesome way to manage bookmarks if you switch between computers a lot. However, I don’t see the point of having and sharing a public profile if you already share links in a Twitter feed or a blog.

Sites I don’t:

MySpace: honestly, I don’t think anyone uses this anymore. Unless your a band (for which this can still be a great homepage) it can probably be ignored.

Flickr: I don’t know about Flickr. It seems like everyone has an account but me, and I’m not sure what I’m missing. I can see it being useful for certain situations, but essential?

YouTube: Like Delicious, this can be a good way to manage videos if you watch them again and again, and is also necessary if you want to upload your own. But if you’re not doing that, I’m not sure this is necessarily something you need as part of your public persona.

  
Technorati: I have a Technorati account, which I’ve used to claim my blogs, but as with Delicious, I don’t feel the need to publicly share which blogs I’m reading or which are my favourites. If there’s soemething I really like, I’ll blog about it.

Skype: I really want to use this, but since I don’t know anyone on it, I don’t see the point.

There’s a lot more, obviously, but these seem to be the big ones, with Reddit, Digg, Newsvine, and StumbleUpon coming to mind as others that are sticking around. I’m hoping to get some feedback on where else I should– or shouldn’t– be moving in the online world.

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