The Facebook for Professionals manual, in particular, should come in handy if you’re new to Facebook and want to know more about its setup or if you’ve been using it primarily for personal reasons and want to make a privacy wall to start using it to make professional connections.

The two charts are diagrams of Facebook and Twitter home pages to explain what’s there and how it works.

In the future, I hope to add more intro information for RSS readers, Digg, Publish2 and more. Stay tuned.

• Colonel Tribune: Chicago’s Unlikely Social Media Pioneer – The story behind Colonel Tribune and the Trib’s successes int he social media sphere using such an unconventional idea.
• Journalists on Twitter – Muck Rack – A listing of journalists currently on Twitter (and no, I haven’t added myself yet).

• Why journalists should learn to code (and why some shouldn’t bother) :: 10,000 Words – “Those who choose to adhere to long-standing forms of print or broadcast journalism shouldn’t fret, but know that there will come a time when basic coding will become an integral part of a journalist’s duties. It’s better to jump on the bandwagon now than to be left in the dust later on.”
• Seattle ‘P-I’ Sinks Without Print Boost – In their Top 30 Newspaper Sites for March, Editor & Publisher makes the point that online-only newspapers aren’t quite making it with audiences just yet. Do they need print to survive? That remains to be seen.
• How To Increase Your Chances of a Twitter Follow Back | John Chow dot Com – A lot of this is what I would consider no brainers, but worth a quick read anyway. Disregard what he says about a custom Twitter background, though. You don’t have to pay for a professional background to get followers – you can always make your own or use a free one.
• Overview: Key News Audiences Now Blend Online and Traditional Sources | Pew Center – This Pew study outlines Americans’ relationships with news, news consumption trends and which media seem to be doing best. Key takeaway: News is still necessary to a lot of Americans…and without online news/blogs, newspapers would be in worse shape than they are right now.

Steve Buttry, the Information Content Conductor (how’s THAT for a title?) at Gazette Communications in Iowa is holding a webinar entitled “Leading Your staff Into the Twitterverse” through the American Society of Newspaper Editors.

Here’s the tipsheet he’s including for the webinar of several resources for those getting started on Twitter. It’s got a lot of info on how to set up and run an account and how to make Twitter work for you as a journalist (including an answer that question I get in every training session, “What do I say?”).

Check it out. Also, revisit yesterday’s post about my own Twitter tips.

I’m a full-time journalist and I know it’s practically impossible to find free time to do more work. Whenever you have the chance – maybe when you run out of hours during your work week or when you have that luxurious furlough (like me) ou should use this time to train yourself in a new skill set. That’s not to say you have to be learning every bit of software out there – but try to pick one or two you want to add t your arsenal. You never know – you might need them for a job search sooner than you think.

** I hope to get these sites and more added to a training resource page on the site ASAP.