The Recruiters Lounge

Exploring the wacky world of employment

Weblin is the Shiznit! Get yours now…

Due to the proliferation of social networks, there has been a lot of talk about data portability lately. In a nutshell, data portability means that I could have one account for several online webservices. For example, if I was logged into my Facebook account and decided to hop over to MySpace, I would not have to log in all over again. If you have multiple accounts on multiple Social Networks and other sites, you immediately recognize how convenient this can be. Enter Google’s Friend Connect.

Google’s “Friend Connect” is a big deal, a very big deal. Friend Connect allows users to sign up for an account on one Social Network (Facebook for example) and use that same profile across multiple social networks, thus alleviating the need to create and manage multiple accounts. There was already a trend heading in this direction with social aggregator sites like Friend Feed, Profilactic and Spokeo enabling you to monitor your activity (and your friend’s activity) across multiple networks. Google has taken the trend to the next logical conclusion, one profile for multiple sites that may one day become a standard for all social networks to adhere to.

The idea is old, but the timing is perfect.

One would not a crystal ball to see this trend coming; seeds of this development have been around for sometime. In 2001, Microsoft introduced “Microsoft Passport” which morphed into “Windows Live ID.” Most of the websites that use Windows Live ID today are Microsoft subsidiaries like: Hotmail, MSNBC and Xbox Live. However, other companies affiliated with Microsoft are accessible via Windows Live ID for example: Expedia and Hoyts. (Read: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Passport )

OpenID made its debut in 2005 and quickly developed into the original shared identity service allowing internet users to log on to different web sites using a single digital identity. It has gained a lot of traction over a relatively short period of time and is in use by such leading companies as AOL, BBC, Google, IBM, Microsoft, Yahoo, Verisign and others. For a deeper look into the history of OpenID, I suggest reading the Wikipedia entry on OpenID. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_id) While the concept itself is nothing new, the buzz around Google’s Friend Connect denotes a “perfect storm” for such an idea.

My Space is also allowing users to share their profile data across such networks as Yahoo, EBay and Twitter. (read: TechCrunch)

I speculate that Google’s Friend Connect and services like it will empower websites to grow traffic very, very rapidly. Once that happens, quality of content will become chief concern to website owners as a consistent audience is of more relevance to advertisers as (soon) anyone will be able to ramp up large numbers of registered users, but the overall majority will not be actively engaged enough to respond to the advertisers message. If you want to experiment in real time with (what I think) is soon to come, check out this VERY cool web application – Weblin.

Weblin is better than data portability, much, much better! Weblin turns any and every website into a virtual chat room akin to Second Life. (Okay, maybe not better than Data Portability, but just as exciting.)

And may I say, Weblin is just too cool for words?

These are some of the reasons why I like Weblin:

• If I go to YouTube, I typically see 15-20 people hanging out there that I can chat with. If I go to Google, there are people there to hang out with as well. This tells me that no matter where I go, I have the chance of meeting people who share my interests by virtue of them being on the same websites that I frequent.

• It is ridiculously easy to use! All one has to do is download the app and then surf the web as normal

• Weblin offers a list of most popular websites that Weblins frequent according to TLD (top level domains). This is good for me if I want to target candidates in the UK for example, who have an interest in marketing blogs.

• I can also dress up my avatar and make it really special (just like Second Life) and buy virtual goodies and so forth. Although I have done neither, I suspect that I will make that plunge; especially since Weblin is starting to grow in popularity. Check out this chart on their traffic from Compete.com. In comparison to sites like Cyworld.com and (the complicated?) SecondLife, they are nowhere near them in terms of traffic. However, the growth trend is looking promising and I pray will continue because I really dig this idea. Imagine if Weblin were to add Open ID or Friend Connect to their system as well. Oh, please, pretty please Weblin, make it so.

As I was playing with Weblin and chatting away with Otis Collier who was (of course) hip to Weblin as well, we began brainstorming ways to use Weblin as a recruiting tool. (Click here to check out his bio on the SourceCon Speakers page)These were some of our ideas.

1. Announce a Virtual Job Fair to select individuals.
2. Ask them to download Weblins and meet you at a special website for jobs targetting their skills. Or better yet, use “Weblin Lite” on the special website. (Weblin lite asks you to enter the URL of a page you’d like to visit. You are then redirected to a Weblin-enabled version of that site where you will have a randomly assigned avatar you can use to chat with. Read more about it here on Mashable.)
3. On the special website, users can watch videos, listen to podcasts and or read content specific to their skills and your company culture.
4. Of course, on the special website would be Recruiters and/or Hiring Managers to chat with. Should someone strike your fancy, you can invite them to a private chat and from there a phone interview and so on.

You have no doubt, heard about companies performing job fairs and interviews in Second Life, but Weblin may be a less complicated (and free) method of doing this. Weblin has a lot more functionality than what I have shown you so far, so be sure to check it out for yourself and (quite possibly) meet me on The Recruiters Lounge blog and chat with me? In the meantime, here is a video showing you a couple of the tricks you can do with Weblin. (You can find more Weblin tutorials by clicking here.)

I hope I can chat with you via Weblin soon.

E’ you later!

-Jim Stroud

P.S. If you want more insight into the world of Recruiting with Virtual Worlds, check out this new blog – Recruiting In Second Life which is written by David D’Angelo. David will be a guest blogger on this site soon, so stay tuned.

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