For over a year now I have been experimenting with "Web2" Internet sites to find ways they can be useful – I personally don't see the point of throwing dead sheep at people or paying real money to send a virtual drink to anyone, and I certainly do not want to receive a picture of something I didn't want in the first place.
But I do believe there is a future in community networking and social websites – we just have not found it yet. Perhaps the Greater Manchester Police ideas will make use of the leverage of Facebook, YouTube and Twitter to find missing people of enable us to report crime as it happens.
This blog is written from my Facebook account and is an experiment to see if this simple integration works – I may mean I can write to a number of blogs simultaneously.
I wrote on www.Twiku.com last year about using mobiles to help find missing children – perhaps this is one step towards that.