Hey, all you creative types. I’m always looking for resources for writers and artists and a few months ago I came across a great little online community called Inked-in. Inked-in is an international social-networking community for writers, musicians and artists.

It’s a great group of people, with over 700 members so far. It is, of course, absolutely free, and it’s safe to say that you will get out of it what you put into it. It is for people who want to be writers, artists and musicians, as well as people already established in their fields.  Inked-In is associated with The Burry Man Writers Center, which you may also want to check out.

This is the mission statement on Inked-In’s home page:

Inked-In connects writers, artists and musicians with each other.

We are a giant, ongoing novel, with pathos and drama, pictures and video, stupid jokes and genuine friendships, and most of all supreme creativity. And you never know where it will head next.

Welcome home!

If you decide to join, check out my page , I’d love to be one of your first friends.

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YOKO ONO is following me on Twitter. It is surreal, as well as fun and wonderful, and could only happen in the blossoming world of social networking.

Some of you younger folks may say: Who is Yoko Ono? Some of you older folks may say: What is Twitter? My best answer is that they are symbols of our times.

At first, it seemed that computers and the web were primarily valuable in regards to the information that could be found and gathered—a more masculine task, as traits go. But through social networking and blogging it seems we have added the feminine qualities to the world wide web—the desire to connect and create relationships with family, friends, colleagues, people you admire, or even with total strangers.

Yoko Ono is known for her work as an avant-guard artist and musician, and her marriage and works with musician John Lennon of the Beatles.  

(photo from Wikipedia: Ono at the opening ceremony of her art exhibition in São Paulo, Brazil. November 2007.)

And Twitter? Well, Twitter is interesting. I saw one of the co-founders of Twitter, Evan Williams, on Charlie Rose recently. He seemed as amazed at Twitter’s success as anyone and remains fascinated by its potential. (He even passed up a purported $300-500 million deal from Facebook because he wants to be onboard to help it meet its potential.)

According to Wikipedia: Twitter is a social-networking and micro-blogging service that allows its users to send and read other users’ updates (known as tweets), which are text-based posts of up to 140 characters in length. Updates are displayed on the user’s profile page and delivered to other users who have signed up to receive them.

If you aren’t on Twitter already, you may be wondering why this is something you might want to check out. I personally “follow” a lot of writers, artists, agents, editors and publishers, as well as everyday people and companies that interest me. This helps me feel connected to what’s going on in the circles that I travel in. Also there are some people that have amazing things to say and link to fascinating articles that I would have never found otherwise.

You can find Yoko Ono at http://imaginepeace.com. And on Twitter at: https://twitter.com/yokoono

Also, please consider following me on Twitter here: https://twitter.com/susangabriel

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I’ve joined the social networking movement and what an interesting ride it is. One thing I’ve been wondering is when we take the time to fill out a profile, add icons, list interests … are we learning more about ourselves?

Self-awareness is supposedly a sign of good mental health. Sure, there are plenty of needy, narcissistic, and unaware people profiled on these pages who are total strangers to good mental health. But there are also plenty of people who genuinely want to connect and who work to create a persona that relays their interests, dreams and passions. They take time to list the books and movies they love, the music they listen to, the quotes that mean the most to them. They join groups that further define them.

As the author of Seeking Sara Summers , I feel a genuine need to connect with my readers and with other authors. Writing is an isolating endeavor and when I finish for the day I want to connect with a community. Sometimes this connection happens with neighbors, sometimes with friends in my same town or friends on the phone. But I also have a desire to connect to a bigger community—a global community. Luckily, this is becoming easier and easier.

We live in interesting times. We make friends now with people we will probably never meet in person, but still we will connect because it is a primal need for human beings. Connection, as far back as the cave men and women, meant survival.

Even today, I think we all want to find our clan. Those people who can understand and appreciate us. We all want to find the place where we belong. Does social networking help us find each other? Does it help us evolve? At its best, I think it does.  

See you on Facebook….