A few years ago, social networking was for kids, lonely adults, nerds, and perverts. Today, everyone uses Facebook. This is a positive development: Facebook is fun, and it serves as a virtual White Pages for all of your friends, telling you where they are and what they're up to at all times. But now that everybody's on Facebook, the stakes are higher: there's more potential for embarrassment and there are more people to rub the wrong way. The company is getting a lot of coverage these days, whether for its new applications, alarmist concerns about sex offenders or the pending lawsuit against the website's founder Mark Zuckerberg. But none of these articles will help you navigate the complex maze that is online social networking. Has a friend ever stopped talking to you because you wrote a cryptic inside joke on his wall that he didn't understand? Or because you posted a picture of him doing drugs and he's been expelled from college? It's a confusing world out there. After the jump, some Miss Manners-style rules to live by that will prevent you from losing friends and alienating people on Facebook.

Walls are public and are therefore supposed to be fun to read. Here is an excerpt from a Friendster "testimonial," (the equivalent of a Facebook wall) circa 2003, from a friend's page: "Want to know what coolness is?/Only take a look at Liz./She's a Capricorn like Jesus/With a wit that always pleases…[etc]." Cute, no? Here's a more recent post on that same friend's Facebook wall, circa last week: "Ack. 'Fraid not. How about Friday or Saturday? Catch-up drink/coffee is absolutely in order." Today, the Facebook wall functions as an open email account. Friendster's testimonials have gone the same way, though Friendster is about as cool as Robin Williams' latest movies. People have been talking for years about how everyone spills her private secrets on the Internet — some might argue that public email inboxes were the inevitable next step. Resist it people: save this kind of catching up for text messaging.

You're much more likely to get a response if you send a real email. Which leads me to the next rule:

Before asking a friend for contact information, check her Facebook page to see if you can find it yourself. I once got a wall message that read "hey, what's your email address?" Well, it's listed in my profile. On the same page. With my cell phone number. Even worse is the friend who wrote me saying that she hadn't been in with a mutual friend because she didn't know his email address. Yet they were friends on Facebook. It made her innocent-seeming excuse ring false. In the odd case where a friend doesn't list her email address, a short Facebook message to her will probably suffice to get you back in touch.

I am not one of the many who believe that the news feed feature is bad in general, but you don't want articles like this one to be referring to you, and your breakup. Oh, and if you do want to break up with your girlfriend, it is proper etiquette to tell her (preferably in person) before changing your relationship status on Facebook.

Instead, let, or kindly suggest that, friends do post them for you. In return, you should post photo albums for your friends (Stephanie's birthday! John and Jane's wedding!). But never post an image that could be incriminating to yourself or others: if you're underage, keep your drinking habits to yourself. Unfortunate PDAs are also no-nos. In posting photographs from your own functions, you're more likely to offend those who were not invited. Furthermore, you run the risk of seeming vaguely pathetic — look how many people like me and came to my party! Oh, and if you're Miss New Jersey, you might consider deleting your profile altogether.

If all these rules sound harsh or complicated, they shouldn't. If you're under thirty, it is more polite to be on the Facebook than to hold out. After all, even Emily Post's daughter, the new Miss Manners, has a profile. — S.E. Kramer