What is Social Networking?

First, let's figure out the term social bookmarking. Social bookmarking refers to the practice of saving and categorizing a particular site and sharing it with others via social bookmarking communities. Users can share their own personal Web bookmarks, but they also have the quite wonderful option of discovering other people’s bookmarks and adding them to their own collection. More sites can be discovered, more treasures unearthed, if you work together as a whole instead of by yourself; it’s truly amazing what people are able to turn up together on the Web.

Social networking is related to social bookmarking: you can make as many bookmarks on the Web as you can possibly stand to do, but once you start sharing these bookmarks with other people, interacting with them, starting conversations through a variety of methodologies, you are networking. You are part of the social networking community.

Basically, you find something you like and share it with other people in a variety of social bookmarking or social networking communities, using tags to help categorize what it is that you’re bookmarking.

Examples of social networking Web sites:
del.icio.us: del.icio.us is a collection of favorites - yours and everyone else's. You can use del.icio.us to: Keep links to your favorite articles, blogs, music, reviews, recipes, and more, and access them from any computer on the web. Share favorites with friends, family, coworkers, and the del.icio.us community.
Furl: Furl gives users the ability to save copies of any Web page, search within your own personal archive of Web pages, and share what you find. Furl was one of the very first social bookmarking tools, and continues to be one that people use to find and share good stuff on the Web.
Reddit: Instantly share your content with the Reddit social bookmarking community.
Yahoo My Web: Sure, search engines have revolutionized how people obtain information, but nothing takes the place of recommendations from people you know. My Web 2.0 lets you instantly tap into the knowledge of people with related or completely new interests so you can share what they know.
Stumbleupon: The beauty of StumbleUpon, to my mind: you are able to take advantage of a vast network of dedicated Web searchers who are finding utterly brilliant sites and sharing them with you. One of my favorite ways to explore the Web.
More Information about Social Networking

Share2Me: Share2me is a free browser plug-in that allows you to share your favorite stuff on the Web with your friends across a variety of platforms with just one click.

Upscoop: Upscoop is a service that finds friends and acquaintances of yours that might be in various social networks on the Web, such as MySpace, Friendster, LinkedIn, etc., based on their unique email address.

Yahoo Answers: Yahoo Answers is a cross between multi-topic message boards and your friendly neighborhood/office/school water cooler. It's a great place to ask a question and get an answer to pretty much ANY question you might have.