Join us for a night with Tara Hunt, author of The Whuffie Factor: Using the Power of Social Networks to Build Your Business. Tara's no stranger to Net Tuesdays--she first spoke in the winter of 2005.

What is the Whuffie Factor? From Tara Hunt's blog, HorsePigCow

Everyone knows about blogs and social networks such as Facebook and Twitter. And they’ve heard about someone who has used them to grow a huge customer base. Everyone wants to be hands-on, grass roots and interactive. But what does this mean? And more to the point, how do you do it?

While The Whuffie Factor will traverse the landscape of Web 2.0 and show you how to become a player, it is not just another book about online marketing. People see the huge business potential of the online world and the first impulse is: let’s throw a bunch of money at it. To which Tara Hunt says: “Stop! Money isn’t the capital of choice in online communities, it is Whuffie - social capital – and how to raise it is the heart of this book.” In the Web 2.0 world, market capital flows from having high social capital. Without Whuffie you lose your connections and any recommendation you make will be seen as spam, met with negative reactions and a loss of social capital.

And who is Tara?

Tara Hunt, is the co-founder of Citizen Agency, a community marketing consulting firm, and has proven, says Jimmy Wales, the cofounder of Wikipedia, “the power of grass roots organizations that really represent the future of business.”