Can We Talk about Social Networks for a Minute?

**Please note - this has been a lousy cloudy, gray and moody day. On top of 2 weeks of flu and other ailments in this house. I'm crabby, cranky and in need of a serious day off or several drinks. Move on if you aren't in the mood to read about me whining.**

How many are you part of? Can you count them all? Do you remember all your passwords to all of them? When was the last time you logged into each one?

I have to confess that I am a part of the social network nightmare. Facebook, MySpace (which I haven't accessed in ages), CafeMom, Twitter, MomDot, Launchpad, and probably some that I can't even remember. And I make the rounds daily (except for the forementioned MySpace). On top of that you have the whole blogging thing where I'm posting and reading and commenting.

Ask me why I'm part of all these things. To gain traffic for my blog. And why do I blog? Because someday I would love to find my writing in a newspaper article like my hero Erma Bombeck. Or in a magazine. I would love to be paid to do what I love - write.

Somewhere along the way someone sold me the idea that if I network with all these other tech savvy people and I put my name out there and I share my links everywhere I can and I comment and post, I would grow my traffic and therefore gain "a presence" on the web and have a better chance at making my dream a reality.

Ask me if any of it has worked. Not so much. Even among the networks centered around blogging, so many people are working on their own publicity and writing that they don't have time to comment and visit and share driving traffic. So what is the point?

And if the whole lack of effect wasn't enough lets get to the issue of how small of a ripple I actually make in the social network world. Facebook friends - 6 from college and 2 sisters in law. Friends from high school? 0. Bloggy buddies? 0.

I wasn't cut out for this whole online life.