Businesses find Facebook, Twitter useful

A few weeks ago, when her husband decided to become a computer repair doctor who makes house calls, Dorothy Blake knew how to help. She added Blake's Mobile Computer Service to her personal Facebook account.

This week, she started learning how to Twitter.

"I'm in the middle of a course now," said Blake, who lives in Sebring. "I've got a couple of e-books and audios. I bought them online."

She's already seen results: one of their fellow members of Unity of Sebring Church called, and James Blake was working on a laptop Thursday.

Commercial purpose

Facebook and Twitter aren't just for social networking anymore.

Jennifer McGee, Habitat for Humanity's development associate, uses Facebook and tweets to attract and inform volunteers. Here's her most recent 112 characters:

"Wall raising Saturday, Feb. 27 on Recreation Drive across from the YMCA in Sebring....come see what we're doing!"

Ask her on Sunday how that worked out, but she already knows it's effective for sale ads. Twitter items are among the first to go at Habitat's resale store on Commerce Street.

"We have 91 followers on Twitter and 579 on Facebook," McGee said. Many are seasonal caravaners - snowbirds who volunteer at the Highlands County chapter for the winter, or vacationers who spend a week or two on a Habitat job.

They may go back to the Great White North before the house is completed, so when McGee posts photos or YouTube videos, they can see how it all turned out.

"They like knowing what's going on," McGee said.

Only you

Melissa Yunas is a wildfire mitigation specialist with the Florida Division of Forestry. She works in the seven-county Okeechobee District, which extends from Highlands to St. Lucie counties. Like a certain helpful bear, she prevents forest fires, but she also works with the media.

"Sometimes, during a fire, I'll post press releases and send photos," said Yunas, who takes a laptop into the field linked by an air card.

The media use the photos, and her comments are followed from as far away as Australia and New Zealand.

A few days ago, she explained why the air around Sebring was smoky: "Highlands Hammock is burning in Hardee County. They are authorized for 173 acres; that does not mean that will burn the entire amount. Their certified burner and burn team will make that decision."

Divorce, Facebook style

The cutting edge of today's social media, according to a Feb. 18 Tampa Tribune story, is the way Facebook is revolutionizing divorce.

There's the Tampa wife who videotaped fights with her husband (camera in one hand, accusing finger in the other), and posted it Facebook.

And there's the Tampa husband, who updated his minute-by-minute frustrations with parenting. His soon-to-be ex-wife's lawyers used his rants against him in a court of law.

Tampa attorney Chris Ragano says Facebook turns up each month in half of new cases. Nowadays, he orders new clients to cancel their Facebook accounts on Day 1 of his retainer. But first, they mine the account for evidence against the other side. There's almost too much evidence to sort through.

Facebook also referees child custody battles: divorced parents read their kid's posts during a weekend with the other parent.

"Facebook makes it so easy," Ragano said.

Sometimes, Facebook is the catalyst for divorce: an old college alum sends a "friend request" to join, which prompts photos of old flames, which leads to wayward thoughts.

"Those wild photos of people drinking and having fun," said Hillsborough County Judge Scott Stephens said, "that's where the baby came from in the first place."

Sunshine law

Tweets, instant messages and other new modes of communication are becoming mainstream, so sunshine law watchdogs are wrestling with how to ensure that public records - and the public officials who generate them - remain public.

E-mail is already public record, but that's so 20th century.

Last year, secret BlackBerry text messages between Public Service Commission staffers and lobbyists were made public. Attorney General Bill McCollum has set up a task force to study what should be public record messages on the emerging social networking universe dominated by Facebook and Twitter, the News Service of Florida reported.

In September, McCollum announced his office would begin retaining BlackBerry messages sent between state phones.

Back to the Blakes

Dorothy Blake started using Facebook three years ago, when she was selling real estate. "Lots of Realtors do," she said.

Now she Facebook's to stay in contact with former friends in real estate."

"A lot of them work from home," she said. "And they have a lot of problems with their computers. There are also a lot of older people who aren't as savvy as younger people."

And there's one more use for Facebook, as Facebookies know:

"I mostly do Facebook to play Mafia Wars," said Blake. "I'm level 689."