Do you have an account on MySpace? On Facebook? On LinkedIn? Or Twitter? Or any number of other 'Social Networking' sites...

Some people join just to hang out with like-minded pals, but more and more people use them as tools to help them get on in life. A pal of mine has a superb MySpace page that reflects the fact that he is a serious cinema buff and a competent creator of web pages, but his beautiful, informative and entertaining page wasn't what impressed me most when I visited it. Among his MySpace friends was a woman who doted on him because he had fixed a computer problem for her (I could tell that by reading her messages to him), and that woman listed Martin Scorsese among her MySpace friends.

If you're a serious film buff and joining MySpace brought you just one hop from counting Marty Scorsese as a friend, it was well worth the effort, wasn't it?

If you rely on people knowing you, trusting you and liking the way you do things in order to succeed in some venture or other (not necessarily a commercial one), then social networks can be used as a tool for establishing your 'brand'.

If your presence on one or more networks consistently demonstrates the characteristics that define you as a person (or, in some cases, define a persona that you use as a brand for a particular venture), people get to know that person well. If you have shown a strong interest in a subject and demonstrated that you not only know a lot about it but that you are happy to help people who are less experienced than you, they will look to you for advice. They will be glad to be your friend. They will listen to you when you recommend a product or a course of action.

But be warned. Some big names have come a serious cropper when they tried to use blogs and social networks as marketing tools. The rules are different. If you use traditional marketing approaches, even the softest of sells, people yell SPAM! SALSEMAN! and many worse things. And you'll have to work very hard to undo the damage.

I know it's not the way HubPages is promoted, but after five months here, I feel that I am a member of a community. We're all here to create stuff and show it to the world, but we also establish ourselves in little groups according to our attitudes and interests. (The first time I remember doing that on the Web was with ThemeStream - anyone remember them?)

I wonder how many of us follow links out of favourite contributors' profiles, or even out of their posts, to find out about the other lives these people lead. It can be an interesting voyage. Try it. Go out to their blog sites if their profiles show the links to them. Post comments on their external sites as well as on their Hubs. You'll probably get to know them better, and you'll almost certainly meet more people and make new friends.

Yes, HubPages may not be as big as MySpace or Facebook - yet - but in my view it is a social network. What do you think?