CAIRO: The American University in Cairo has recently taken advantage of social media websites to expand its online presence. In addition to the school's main website, AUC is now using such social networking sites as Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, and LinkedIn. “Our suite of social media is designed to be global in scope to appeal to all AUC’s current and prospective stakeholders,” said Doaa Farag, the school's media representative. By utilizing these different sites, AUC believes it can present specific information to specific audiences. At the same time, it can link content across platforms making it easy to, “jump to content on Flickr or the new AUC blog with the click of the mouse”. Starting this academic year, AUC has launched its on blog, AUC Now. The school hopes this platform will engage readers in the academic, cultural and community service activities that take place at the university. While the new blog is a “work in progress,” Farag noted that AUC intends to cultivate the work of student and faculty to add new content in the future. This may include may include news stories, photos or videos that are linked to AUC's other pages on sites like Flickr, Youtube and Facebook. On Facebook, AUC has both English and an Arabic language “Fan” pages. The site allows the school to maintain a conversation between student, faculty and alumni by posting news articles, information on upcoming events, and even photos from both the Downtown and New Cairo campuses. “Fans” of AUC on Facebook are able to continue this conversation by commenting on the stories and photos. The Facebook page also contains numerous video clips from AUC's Youtube channel. This video channel, which started last year, evolved along with the Facebook Fan page. The channel now has almost 10,000 views and features videos on AUC campus life, public events and lectures, and academic panels. AUC's own student run news program, “15 Minutes”, is also available through the Youtube channel. More recently, AUC has expanded its social networking beyond Facebook and Youtube. The university now has two profiles on Twitter, one for news and one for school events. Twitter is a service that allows users to tell ‘what they are doing' in 140 characters or less. Other Twitter users can follow AUC's “tweets” to get the latest information from the school through shortened hyperlinks. The university also maintains profiles on the photo sharing site Flickr and the professional networking site LinkedIn. AUC will continue to evolve its presence online as it learns from other institutions of higher learning and through feedback from its online audience. “We are constantly looking for new ways to interact with the AUC community and we will continue to refine and expand our cyber presence,” said Farag. The American University in Cairo has recently expanded its online presence by joining a number of new online communities and social networking sites. In addition to the school's main website, AUC is now using such social networking sites as Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, and LinkedIn. “Our suite of social media is designed to be global in scope to appeal to all AUC’s current and prospective stakeholders,” said Farag, the school's media representative. By utilizing these different sites, AUC can present specific information to specific audiences. At the same time, it can link content across platforms making it easy to, “jump to content on Flickr or the new AUC blog with the click of the mouse”. Starting this academic year, AUC has launched its on blog, AUC Now. The school hopes this platform will engage readers in the academic, cultural and community service activities that take place at the university. While the new blog is a “work in progress”, Farag noted that AUC intends to cultivate the work of student and faculty to add new content in the future. This may include news stories, photos or videos that are linked to AUC's other pages on sites like Flickr, Youtube and Facebook. On Facebook, AUC has both English and Arabic language “Fan” pages. The site allows the school to maintain a conversation between student, faculty and alumni by posting news articles, information on upcoming events, and even photos from both the Downtown and New Cairo campuses. “Fans” of AUC on Facebook are able to continue this conversation by commenting on the stories and photos. The Facebook pages also contain numerous video clips from AUC's Youtube channel. This video channel, which started last year, evolved along with the Facebook Fan page. The channel now has almost 10,000 views and features videos on AUC campus life, public events and lectures, and academic panels. AUC's own student run news program, “15 Minutes”, is also available through the Youtube channel. More recently, AUC has expanded its social networking beyond Facebook and Youtube. The university now has two profiles on Twitter, one for news and one for school events. Twitter is a service that allows users to tell “what they are doing” in messages of 140 characters or less. Other Twitter users can follow AUC's “tweets” to get the latest information from the school through shortened hyperlinks. The university also maintains profiles on the photo sharing site Flickr and the professional networking site LinkedIn. AUC will continue to evolve its presence online as it learns from other institutions of higher learning and through feedback from its online audience. “We are constantly looking for new ways to interact with the AUC community and we will continue to refine and expand our cyber presence,” said Farag. BM
