This stuff wasn't even on the BBSes when I was coming out of school, although if you ran your own board, you were qualified to work in technology.  

I guess what I continue to be curious about is how many niche sites keep launching aimed solely at that demographic before opening up for good financial reason.  It's not just FB and MySpace, but they are the two obvious examples.  It's much the same way that popular music keeps redefining itself into ever smaller niches.  I see this as a combination of a lot of good ideas, but I don't know how the brew will eventually taste.   Heck, I don't even know if there will be channel conflict with HotJobs or whichever one Yahoo owns.

I did a get a kick out of this bullet:  "Keep your social profile fun, but your professional profile polished."    I don't think that's possible anymore.  Has anyone declared FB bankruptcy yet?  I keep thinking about it because anyone who can structure a decent search query can easily combine the two.  Interestingly enough, I read an interview with a LinkedIn exec who said he is not an open networker and then said he would connect with any alum from his school.  Not his classmates -- the past and present ones too. 

The same week, I was coaching a group of management students at George Mason University on how to give their capstone class presentations.  Microsoft had just done the FB deal, and the students didn't know about it yet.  When I told them, one of them was adamant that FB had "sold out" and made "a big mistake" by opening to all audiences.  I didn't have the heart to tell him the site's origin was for Ivy Leaguers, not GMU students either.  But he balked at my point, which was, of course, the size of the deal and the extensions.  He still had this idealistic streak that caused him to insist that FB should have kept its doors closed to non-college students, although he didn't address if graduation meant you were kicked out of FB just like the guys used to age out of Menudo.

I added a profile.  Sure, there are no Smashing Pumpkins (super poke-style or music), but I dropped in 3 or 4 unrelated facts, my degree and site.  (shrug).  I'm not very impressed yet.  It looks LinkedIn with more pastels.  Maybe they'll surprise me.