I joined Facebook primarily to obtain a new opportunity. My job was cut short when my nasty boss replaced me with someone less than half my age. And she took great joy in terminating me.

It is no secret that I hate living in New York. The politics, rat race, high cost of living, the lack of jobs, snow, cold winters, and over crowding have all taken its toll on me. I yearn to live and work in the Keys and that is no secret either.

So I joined FB and started to connect to people in the Keys as virtual friends. It is with high hopes that one of them just may have the right connection that can open the door for me to get a new job there. Right now I have around 310 FB friends in the Keys and have communicated with a few directly.

I continued to reach out to people on FB that are in the Keys to connect with me. This way my network would grow as well as any possibility of landing a new job. But a few individuals that I reached out to, (I don't know who they are) made a complaint to FB saying that they do not know me.

 FB has now suspended my ability to invite people to connect with me for 7 days and threatened to suspend or close my account if I continue to invite people to connect that I do not personally know.

WTF is with that? I bet that close to 99% of the people on FB do not know everyone that they are connected to personally. Come on FB give me a break!

The whole crux of FB, to build up a social relationship with others and have some fun doing it.

I look at it like this, if you do not want to accept my friend request, then don't. Don't go out on the limb and play FB police and make trouble for other people.

Another reason I joined FB is for fact finding and to learn more about the Keys and life there.  Is it a place to target for a new job and life or not?  Of course FB cannot provide me with all the information that I need but it is giving me some insights in how the area is.

A side reason is for the social aspect that FB brings about.  And I do have the contacts as friends and I honestly hope to meet some of them some day in person.  Hopefully if I get a job and can move there.

So using FB is critical to my future.

I am also on LinkedIn and have reached out to various people there as well.  Again since I was terminated I need a job.  By asking people to connect with me there has the same effect only on a more professional level.  A lot of the people on LinkedIn are the decision makers of business and trying to connect to them can be helpful in obtaining employment.

I have requested not only executives from various companies like Real Estate to connect with me, but recruiters across the country as well.  Not only that I am connecting to people from Florida and the Keys as well.  Strange as it is there are a few on LinkedIn that connected with me that are on my FB list as well.

This way my search network expands a lot and increases my chances of landing a new job.  So far nothing has happened in 3 months but I am hopeful.

Now LinkedIn pulled a FB on me and is not allowing me to reach out and connect with people at all.  They put restrictions on my account making it difficult to next to impossible to connect with people.  And this part all boils down to they want me to upgrade my account which means they want money.  It is difficult now looking for work but don't add road blocks and restrictions in the way.

I changed the header on my FB page asking if anyone that is connected to me on FB wants to connect with me on LinkedIn, to send me a message so we can move froward on the connection.  The restriction that LinkedIn put on me, is that I need to know their email address to prove that I know them personally.

Side trip - wait one minute, looking at the LinkedIn connections some people have over 500.  Are you telling me that they know all 500+ people personally?  I don't think so.

Hey LinkedIn, give me a break will ya!  You to FB!

The company is paying my COBRA until December 31st as part of my severance.  With the way that the job hunt has been going I do not foresee a job very soon unless my networking contacts and poke the right person in my direction.  To make matters worse, it looks like my wife is having a kidney failure which ultimately may mean dialysis.  And that will squash any chance of visiting the Keys or travel.  Plus with the costs involved, we will have to declare bankruptcy, go on public assistance and lose any chance of a future without medical coverage.  But we have only an early blood test and the Dr. wants to repeat it next week just in case of a transient spike.  So my fingers are crossed.

More on Medicaid in New York in a later entry.

So right now using FB and LinkedIn as part of my job search tools has become more critical than ever before and I do not need the BS of having needless restrictions placed on me or the threats of closing my account from someone that wants to play FB police.

'till next time