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OLAT groups within social networks (Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Xing, Ohloh)

We are aware that social networks are becoming more and more important for communication both on a private and on a business level. That's why we created OLAT groups in the most popular Social Networks. We would like to encourage you to become a member of these groups and participate at group activities.

OLAT.org website remains the main communications channel!
These groups are not meant as a replacement to our website or our mailing lists! But they offer some nice features that we cannot offer on our website. For example we might publish one or two photos about an OLAT event on our website and additionally publish a photo album within Facebook where you can also publish comments etc. So please use these groups as an additional channel for communication within the OLAT community but not as the unique communication channel.

Twitter

In countries all around the world, people follow the sources most relevant to them and access information via Twitter as it happens - from breaking world news to updates from friends. There are no Groups, just use the search to check out what's up on OLAT!

"Twitter is a free social networking and micro-blogging service that enables its users to send and read messages known as tweets. Tweets are text-based posts of up to 140 characters displayed on the author's profile page and delivered to the author's subscribers who are known as followers. Senders can restrict delivery to those in their circle of friends or, by default, allow open access. Users can send and receive tweets via the Twitter website, Short Message Service (SMS) or external applications. While the service, itself, costs nothing to use, accessing it through SMS may incur phone service provider fees." (Wikipedia 2008)

Check out the Twibes summary service (groups Twitter users based on their interests and hobbies).

Facebook

US-Student Mark Zuckerberg's Facebook is probably one of the most famous social networks. We are aware that Facebook is mainly used for private social interaction and not for business but we would still like to gather the OLAT community in Facebook using this group. Here's what Wikipedia says:

"Facebook is a social networking website launched on February 4, 2004. The free-access website is privately owned and operated by Facebook, Inc. Users can join networks organized by city, workplace, school, and region to connect and interact with other people. People can also add friends and send them messages, and update their personal profile to notify friends about themselves. The website's name refers to the paper facebooks depicting members of a campus community that some US colleges and preparatory schools give to incoming students, faculty, and staff as a way to get to know other people on campus." (Wikipedia 2008)
  • Social Network Type: Private contacts
  • Members: About 3 million users
  • Translations: 35 Languages available
  • Groups: About 20 million groups available
  • Headquarters: Palo Alto, California, USA
  • Fee: No membership fee
  • I want to join the "OLAT" group on Facebook!

LinkedIn

The US-based LinkedIn business network offers the possibility to create a personal profile and add business contacts (called "connections") to your profile. These contacts can send or request recommendations to/from you and you also have the possibility to list your experiences, current and past jobs, education etc. within your profile. Here's what Wikipedia says:

"LinkedIn is a business-oriented social networking site founded in December 2002 and launched in May 2003 mainly used for professional networking. As of December 2007, its site traffic was 3.2 million visitors per month, up 485% from the end of 2006. As of October 2008, it had more than 30 million registered users, spanning 150 industries." (Wikipedia 2008)
  • Social Network Type: Business contacts
  • Members: About 30 million users
  • Translations: English, French and Spanish in Beta mode
  • Groups: 180'000 active groups
  • Headquarters: Mountain View, California, USA
  • Fee: Basic account free, Premium account available for $20 to $200/month
  • I want to join the "OLAT" group on LinkedIn!

Xing (former OpenBC)

Europe's answer to LinkedIn is called XING. It offers nearly the same features as LinkedIn with the exception of adding and inviting to events ("Termine"). Compared to LinkedIn the groups in Xing are created after being reviewed by a Xing staff member and groups offer more features. Here's what Wikipedia says:

"XING (named openBC/Open Business Club until November 17, 2006) is a social software platform for enabling a small-world network for professionals. The company operating it claims that it is used by people from over 190 countries, albeit the majority of users are Germans. By displaying how each member is connected to any other member, it visualises the small-world phenomenon.

The platform offers personal profiles, groups, discussion forums, event coordination, and other common social community features. Basic membership is free. But many core functions, like searching for people with specific qualifications or messaging people to whom one is not already connected, can only be accessed by the premium members. Premium membership comes at a monthly fee of around 9 USD. The platform uses https and has a rigid privacy and no-spam policy. Unlike many other networking websites, XING provides its members very easy email access to any members. " (Wikipedia 2008)
  • Social Network Type: Business contacts
  • Members: About 7 million users
  • Translations: German, English, Spanish, Turkish and Chinese
  • Groups: 15'000 active groups
  • Headquarters: Hamburg, Germany
  • Fee: Basic account free, Premium account available for 6 Euro/month
  • This OLAT group communicates mainly in German!
  • Ich will der "OLAT" Gruppe in XING beitreten!

Ohloh

This social network is only targeted at open source projects and its developers. Through retrieving the sourcecode from the projects repository (CVS, SVN etc.) it derives statistics like the activity of the project, the amount of active developers, the licenses etc. We maintain a project website for OLAT on Ohloh and you can find some statistics on the OLAT development page! Here's what Wikipedia says:

"Ohloh is a website which provides a web services suite and online community platform that aims to map the landscape of open source software development. It was founded by former Microsoft managers Jason Allen and Scott Collison in 2004 and joined by the developer Robin Luckey. " (Wikipedia 2008)
  • Social Network Type: Open Source projects and developers
  • Members: About 180'000 developers
  • Translations: English
  • Groups/projects: 50'000 open source projects listed
  • Headquarters: Bellevue, Washington, USA
  • Fee: No membership fee
  • Click the button below to join the "OLAT" project on Ohloh:
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