Defense Department creates online hub for social media

The Pentagon has set up an online social media hub to better coordinate policies and to provide online links to service sites on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and the like.

Social media at the Defense Department has gotten so popular it now has its own Web page “hub” to coordinate it all.

DOD today launched an updated Social Media Hub Web page to provide quick links to service-affiliated Facebook, Twitter and YouTube social media sites as well as policy documents, training manuals and other information and to provide a forum for discussion.

The military services have been active participants in social media. For example, as of today, the U.S. Marine Corps’ Facebook page counted more than 435,000 fans; the Army’s, 344,000; the Navy’s, 162,000; Air Force’s, 95,000; Defense Department’s, 38,000; Coast Guard’s, 19,000; and National Guard’s, 10,000.


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Each service has a page on the hub that contains links to various social media sites and resources.

“Our goal is to create a ‘hub’ in every essence of the word — a place where anyone interested in learning more about social media practices amongst the services, as well helpful social media tips and tricks, could come to find everything they might need right at their fingertips,” said Joelle Zarcone, public affairs specialist on the social media team in the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Public Affairs.

The hub includes policy and guidelines for social media use, links to social media registry and registration pages for each service and a discussion board now under construction.