Semiblock Your Facebook Wall
Q: How can I keep my professional friends from seeing the personal stuff I post on my Facebook Wall?
A: To block your Facebook Wall from selected friends, start by creating a Block List, as follows. From the left column of your Facebook home page, hover over the LISTS options until the MORE option appears, then click MORE. Click the Create a List button and enter a List Name (such as Blocked List), then click Create List.
Click the Add friends option and click on the friends you want to add to your Blocked List, then click Done. Next, edit your privacy settings as follows. From the dropdown arrow located in the upper-right corner of the Facebook main page, select Privacy Settings. Under the Control Your Default Privacy heading, click the Custom button. Under the Hide this from heading, type the name Blocked List (or the name of the list you created) in the These people or lists box, and click the Save Setting button (see screenshot below).
Thereafter, Facebook friends that you include in your Blocked List will be unable to view your Wall. As you confirm (accept) new friends in the future, Facebook will offer the opportunity to add them to a list, including your Blocked List. Note that your friends can be included on multiple lists; for example, I have several friends that belong to my “Hometown,” “High School,” “College” and “Send A Christmas Card” lists. This measure will allow you to share a Facebook relationship with your professional Facebook friends, but prevent them from seeing the casual jokes and stories you post for your personal Facebook friends.
In addition, Facebook recently added an audience selector tool, which allows you to control who can view each of your individual Wall posts. To use this tool, enter your status comment as you normally would, then, in the lower-right corner of the Update Status dialog box, click the dropdown menu beside the Post button and choose the list of friends you want to view the comment, then click Post.
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