Welcome to the inaugural blog post for All People Bulletin! This will be a resource for searching out lost friends and loved ones, including tips and advice on using the tools available to aid in people searches. This will also be a place to find unique APB stories, successes and answers to any questions you’ve got.
Social networks are pretty powerful things. They let us connect with others, share interests, and exchange information about what matters to us. Thanks to sites like Facebook, Myspace and Twitter, people are keeping up with each other far better than they ever have before. And personal blogs let the writers among us speak out about the things that motivate, concern and inspire them. Like the adage says, it’s a small world, and getting smaller all the time, thanks to the connections we make online.
But even with the social networks, people search databases and other info out there, it’s still not always easy to find people we’re looking for. We might reconnect with some old high school friends on Facebook but never be able to find that girl we had a crush on in 4th grade. We can follow the tweets of our workplace mentors, but tracking down that old roommate is next to impossible. Social networking sites and people searches have interfaces that let us search for people by name, but if the people we’re seeking aren’t in those databases or on those sites (or worse, if their names have changed since we last knew them), we might never track them down. In this era of communication and connection, it’s frustrating to hit a wall like this.
That’s where APB comes in. The All People Bulletin is a system by which you can “spread the word” about your missing person to a variety of social networking pages and blogs. The millions of users who log onto social networking sites or read blogs each day can then see your message, and if they know something that can help you, they can enter that info on the APB site and help you find your lost person. It’s the power of people, and it can make a huge difference in searching out long-lost friends or relatives.
Your message might not have much to it; for example, it might say something like: ”I’m looking for a girl who went to St. Anthony Catholic School in Morrisville, TX, in 1984. Her first name was Beth, and she had red hair.” That’s not enough information for a people search to go on, but with APB, someone might see your message and think, “Hey, I went to that school during that time, and I remember a red-haired girl named Beth Rogers.” Then this person can click the APB widget, they can enter the information they’ve got (in this case, a last name for Beth) into the APB page, and the APB system will notify you via email that your APB got a response. Thanks to the help of a social network site user, you now have a last name for Beth, and your chances of finding her are greater.
APBs are a great way to harness the power of online communities and networks. And who knows? The person who clicks to add information about an APB might actually be the person you’re looking for! Imagine if Beth Rogers herself were to see the widget and think, “Hey, that’s me!” She could go to the APB page to enter her info, and before you know it, you’d be back in touch.
APB widgets aren’t just for seeking out people, though. The widgets are part of the Yovia Alert Network, an alert dissemination system. When there’s an Amber Alert or Terror Alert issued nationwide, all of the widgets in the network will flip immediately to display the details of the alert. This is an excellent system for spreading breaking news that can potentially impact people across the country. We encourage bloggers and other social network site users to install the widget on their own pages and help spread the news of the Yovia Alert Network. Of course, in the absence of an alert, the All People Bulletin content will be displayed, helping people find each other across the web.
APBs cost just $9 to issue. You can let the APB run as long as you like, and you can cancel anytime, whether or not you find your lost person. It’s an inexpensive way to let social networking sites do the legwork for you, while you sit back and take in the news that other people supply.
When people searches fail you, APB can help! Put out an APB today and start finding those long-lost friends and loved ones.