UW-Madison and the Facebook

While students at UW-Whitewater continue to get ticketed as a result of Facebook pictures (story), the people of UW-Madison are using the Facebook to get ahead of the game. A friend was recently asked by The Daily Cardinal, a student run newspaper, for an interview as a result of his posting Freakonomics as one of his favorite books.

Here's the email my friend received...

My name is "name withheld", and I'm a reporter with the Daily Cardinal. I'm dropping you an email because I'm currently working on a story about the book Freakonomics by Steven Levitt, and on your Facebook profile you listed it as one of your favorite books. I wanted to know if you'd be willing to answer a few questions about it, so I can get the opinions of econ students who read it.

If you are I'm available to talk tomorrow morning, all of Monday and Sunday afternoon, or if you'd prefer to handle this over email we can do that as well. Please let me know as soon as possible by email or phone (my number's at the bottom), so we can get something going - the story deadline is Tuesday, so the sooner the better.

Amusing how one school is able to use the features of the Facebook (instant polling of user interests school-wide) so effectively to enhance the quality of a school newspaper, while another school is using the Facebook (and the photos on it) to crack down on kids and invade what they believed was private.

Have a story of how the Facebook is being used at your school? I would love to hear it.

Tags: Facebook, UW-Madison