For those who aren’t familiar with WordPress, it is the blogging software that is running my site. I am happy with the decision I made to use it.

One of the great things about WordPress is it allows other developers to customize their own installation via plugins and themes. In reality, the possibilities are endless with what you can accomplish.

Automattic, the company who created WordPress and runs wordpress.com, has recently started BuddyPress. BuddyPress allows you to transform WordPress MU into a social networking platform. They have already created some useful plugins.

Even though I think this is an awesome project, I have one thing that I would love to see. I want to add these social networking features to an individual WordPress blog or have one WordPress MU installation communicate with another. I think everybody that wants to should be able to participate in social networks but do so from the comfort of their own web site.

There is lots to be said on that topic. But it’s late. More later.

If you don’t have a Facebook account, get one and then let me know so that we can connect. Social networking can be pretty fun. It makes it easier to stay in touch with friends and contacts. I’m excited to start looking around and finding people from high school and past jobs.

I have been wanting to do this for a long time. I read a lot of buzz regarding all of the applications that can be added to your profile. That is what finally pushed me to go ahead and do it.

Why didn’t I do it before today? Because it still doesn’t give me what I want. And that is to control everything of mine. When I enter information in Facebook, that information is still there. There is now way to extract it or update it outside of Facebook.

Since I am still in the job market, I am also looking for new ways to find a job. I noticed Jobster created a Facebook app that I will be exploring in the near future. Do you know of others that may help me in my job search?

If you are already on Facebook, add me as a friend.

I’m sick of creating a profile on just about every web site I visit. And then as I am looking for a job, companies want a copy of my resume (to only store, since they never look at it). This has become especially troublesome lately.

What happens if I update my resume? Each site that has my resume will not know about this change. And I realize this isn’t a problem that needs to be addressed immediately (my immediate needs include finding a job). Currently, I will update my resume on a site if I need to and I want a job bad enough from that employer. But if these employers want the best people, is their current solution the best way to go about it?

The same goes for every site wanting me to create a profile. I have created my share of sites where a profile is useful to each user and hopefully the site provided benefits to each of the users that went to the trouble to provide their personal information.

Let me give an example. When I first started my job search, I created a LinkedIn profile. I have been able to edit my profile, add contacts and have my contacts provide recommendations for me to be included on my profile.

Then last week I found Jobster. They have similar features once you create a profile. You are able to network with other users and have them added to your personal network. Although Jobster made it easy for me to import contacts, I noticed most of the contacts in my network on LinkedIn do not have a profile on Jobster.

I have already emailed some people to ask them to create a LinkedIn profile. Some have done so. Some I sure never will. But do you really think I want to do the same thing by emailing these same people to create a profile on Jobster and add me to the network? Not really.

I recognize that both LinkedIn and Jobster have very similar features, while some features are different. They both are trying to get me to use their network primarily.

What I am looking for is one place to be able to accomplish any task on the web. Ideally, it would be great if LinkedIn and/or Jobster provided an API to allow me and others to create a profile on my own web site and allow all the features that are provided on their own sites.

So when somebody is searching for a Java developer in Seattle, they are provided with my profile information that I updated on my own web site. Once they visit my site, they will also be provided with samples of my work, what I think about, perhaps a beautiful picture of myself. The point is I get to provide them with the information I want them to know and keep it updated on one site.

I know that many sites are starting to implement OpenID into their sites. For those who don’t know, OpenID provides a decentralized single sign-on system. This would make it so I don’t have to register on every site I visit. But not a lot sites support OpenID yet.

Back to the resume problem. It might be cool to have some kind of resume API or tagging system to provide to employers. They can then add it to their tools when trying to find somebody to fulfill a current job opening. I would just have to update my resume on my web site and I would still be found by those employers that need somebody with my skills.

Is there an opportunity here? Possibly.

I have heard a lot about people using their own web sites as a resume. I will be blogging more about that in the future.

Let me know what you think. Why does every site want my resume/profile? Why can’t I keep that information on my own web site?

I want 2007 to be even better. Here are my goals for the new year to help me accomplish this.

• Market myself better using this blog.
• Find ways to network with other people.
• Manage my time more effectively and become more organized.

That’s pretty much it. I think about these things often. I will go into more details on why these are a big deal to me and how I plan to do it. Perhaps I can get suggestions from others that will help.

One of the items on the list was to create a LinkedIn profile. I still have to personalize my profile, add connections, etc. but that will happen over time.

For those of you who don’t know, LinkedIn is a social networking site that is primarily used for professional networking. The idea is I have a person I know that I add to my network and that person knows other people. These people can then help find jobs, services, recommendations, etc. I have heard great things about it. It seems to be another great tool the Internet provides for job seekers.

So let’s make some connections and build up our profiles (assumming if you don’t have a profile, you will create one) together. Currently I have a good job but I think it is always necessary to add to your network.

My profile can be found at http://www.linkedin.com/profile?viewProfile=&key=8533842. I’ll see you on my network!