Facebook is the most popular social media in today’s world. The social media craze, which started with Orkut, is ultimately settled on Facebook. As more and more people are getting inducted daily to facebook, we thought of writing a beginner’s guide – How to create a facebook account.
First of all, why do we need to have a facebook account? I will say that we do need it for socialization or to be very specific virtual socialization. Through Facebook, you can always be in touch with your friends and relatives. You can share your current status and also come to know about other’s current status. You can share memorable moments with others by sharing Photos and Videos. There are many more reasons, why you should have a Facebook account. We will find out all such dimensions as we go along and explore how to facebook.
How to open a Facebook account – Anybody can open a facebook account providing he\she has a mail id. Open the url
http://www.facebook.com and enter the relevant details and submit. You will get a verification mail in your mail box. Click on the link in the mail to validate your mail address. And that’s it. Now you have created your first facebook account! Next, we will find out the initial configuration of facebook, which will help you to expand your social perimeter.
Setting your profile : Now it is time to set up your profile. Click on your account name on the top right panel. Now, you can add your profile picture by clicking on “Add Profile Picture” and cover photo by clicking on “Add cover”. Now click on “About You”. This will take you to the tab, where you can enter your basic profile information. Though, it may not be essential to use your facebook, it is always suggested, as it helps all the like-minded people to come with in a circle. Other than basic information, this tab also has information about your likes. If you select proper likes, music, movies, books etc, you will be visible in Facebook Graph search, when someone looks for people with same interest in your circle.
Invite your friends to your facebook – On the top right panel, you can see “Find Friends” just before your name. Click on this and you will see number of mail tags. Click on “Find Friend” link beside the mail, from which you would like to import your friends to facebook invitation list. Once you click on “Find Friend” link, the system will ask you to enter your mail id and followed by userid\password combination. Post authentication, it will show you all the friends name in Step 2. By default, all the friends are checked and imported to facebook. You can check only the check boxes for the friends that you want to import to facebook. Now click on “Add Friend”. Friend invite will be sent to the friends. The third step is “Invite Friend”. You can even send mail invitation to your mail contacts to join facebook and Step 3 i.e. “Invite Friends” is meant for the same.
Basic Account Settings – Now click on SettingsàAccount Settings. On the left hand pane, you will see different options. Click on “General”. You will get the following fields to edit
Name : Should be your original name
Username : You can change your facebook account name providing that is not already in use. Your account must be verified before you can change your user name.
Email : You must have at least one valid mail associated with Facebook. You can change this mail id anytime you want.
Password : Can change your password from here.
Network : You can join different Facebook Network here or can remove yourself from a network here.
Language : You can change your default language from here.
Privacy Settings – On the left pane, the third option is “Privacy”. Under “Privacy Settings and Tools”, you will find the below items
Who can see my stuff : This states, who all can see your future post. Remember that this will not be applied to the old posts. The options here are a) Friends and your friend’s friends b) Only your friends c) Only you – Here the post will not be visible to anyone else other than you. d) You can also set it to Custom, where you can choose specific friends, who will be able to see your posts. There are few other options available here as well. Similarly, there are provisions to set privacy for who can contact you or who can look you up by checking your mail id.
Timeline and Tagging : Where privacy is applicable to the messages posted by you or your friends, Timeline and tagging revolves around your timeline and tagging restriction. Generally, when someone post some messages or status update, it reflects in message feed. You or your friends can post in your timeline as well, which will always be visible as a part of your timeline. You can control the access of the friends, who can write or see your timeline. Similarly, you can control who can tag you in facebook.
Now, we have completed the basic set up. Next, let us see how to facebook.
What should I do once I create a facebook account?
Update your status – Click on Home on right top panel and then “News Feed” on the left pane. Here, you will be able to see other’s status update and update yours. You can see a small box, where you can enter your status. Click on the privacy setting just beside the “Post” button. You will be able to see the similar kind of options that you encountered in “Privacy” setting. This setting is particular to this post and overrides the setting that you have applied in Privacy. After entering your status, once you click on Post, it will be visible to your intended facebook connections. On the same box, you will be able to see four small icons (encircled in red in the picture). They are a) State with whom you are b) location c) Adding a photo or video d) Adding a smiley. Alternatively, you update your status in Timeline. The difference between these two is that when you enter your status in Newsfeed, it will appear in other’s newsfeed and gradually go down the list with time and people will not be able to see it. Whereas, when you post in your timeline, it will always be visible when someone sees your profile.
Send a message to your friend – You can directly send a message to your friend. This can be done in two ways. When you add a friend to facebook, they are visible on the right hand panel. If there is a green button next to your friend, it means he is available online. You can click on the name and start chatting. If the person is not available online, you can still send an offline message. Alternatively, you can go to his timeline and click on the Message button on the cover photo.
Tagging a friend to a group – You can organize your friend list in groups such as Close friends, Family or any other group. For that, go to your timeline and click on friends. Now click on the Friends button next to your friend. You can choose “Close Friend” or can add him to any other list. Even you can create your own group through HomeàGroupsà Create Group. From here itself, you can control the messages that you want to see in your newsfeed.
Though, there are many other features of Facebook, the above points are good enough to set you sail in Facebook.
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