Registering a new account

To register for a free account on billion7 you'll first need to complete the registration form.

We need your date of birth to make sure you're old enough to use this social networking site. Your date of birth will not be displayed to anyone, but it could be used when searching for people who are within an age range.

Once you have completed the registration form, we will send you an email, so that we can make sure your email address exists, and that no mistakes were made when typing it in. We also need your email address so that when someone sends you a message via the billion7 website, we are confident that the message is being sent to the correct email address.

You can always change your email address at a later date, without having to register again.

Signing In and Out

When you have registered the first thing you'll want to do is Sign In, so you can start editing your own profile page. Click on the Sign In link near the top left hand corner and then enter the e-mail address and password.

If you're a regular user of billion7 from your home computer some modern browser can remember and automatically enter your email address and password, to save you having to type it in every time.

Once you have signed in you will be automatically taken to your profile page. You will also see a lot more links in the top right hand corner. Click on these new links to make changes to your profile page.

To sign out, click on the 'Sign Out' link near the top right corner, and your will be immediately signed out. Alternatively, terminating your browser application will also sign you out.

Name Search

You can search for someone by typing in their name on the main page.

If you can only remember parts of someone name, just enter the parts in the correct order, separated by spaces. Wherever you enter a space character, any number, of any characters (letters) will be matched. So for example if you type "Al John", this would be enough to find "Alan Johnston".

The search is not case sensitive, so if you had typed in, "al john", this would also work.

Remember that when searching for someone's name you can use characters which are specific to certain languages. For example typing is a ö will find people with an umlaut over the "o".

Advanced Search

The main purpose of the Advanced Search , is to refine your search. If using the name search on the main page returned too many results, you might have better luck using the advanced search.

Using the advanced search you can use any one or a combination of the following criteria: Name, Gender, Age, Continent, Country, Region or Hometown.

Work Search

Work Search enables you to find people by their occupation or skill set. It helps you find people to employ, who are looking for employment, or business contacts. Using 'Work Status' you can find people who own businesses, are self-employed, even retired, all within a continent, country, region and/or home town.

Social Search

Social Search allows you to search for people who share the same hobby or interest as you. It may even help you find that special someone. Use any of the search criteria to find people like you.

Contacts

Once you have signed in you will see a 'Contacts' link near the top right of the page. To add contacts you can search for people on billion7. Click on their name to view their profile, and then within their profile page click on the 'Add to my contacts' link.

A contact invite is sent by email. When the contact receives the email, they will be able to accept the invite, and they will be added to your contacts list. You will also be automatically added to their contacts list as well.

If you think a contact invite was lost because the email was hidden by a spam filterer, you can always repeat the process, and send out another invite.

To remove someone from your contacts list, click on their name to view their profile page. You will notice that there is now a link called, 'Remove from my contacts'. Click on this link, and this person will be removed from your contacts list.

Profile : Links   (Available after signing in)

This is the section where you create colored buttons to your other websites. It's where you can create the 'hub' for your blogs, and photos, etc.

Clicking on the 'Links' option, you will see two more options below: Main Links and Profile Links. The main links create the buttons which will appear when people do the initial search for you. The profile links are for the buttons which will appear on the second row in on your profile page.

If you know the URL of a website you can just type it in. eg. www.myblog.com but you'll probably find it easier and less error prone if you open the website in another browser window and then copy and paste the URL from the top of the browser window.

If you add a title to your button, then this text will appear when someone hovers their mouse over the button. If you don't add anything to the title box, then the URL will be displayed.

Use one of the drop down menus to select the category for the link. This will determine which button is displayed. Use the other drop down menus to control whether this is a link to a favorite website, or one of your websites. The final menu can be use to control who can see the button.

Once you have finished adding your links don't forget to click on the Save button at the bottom of the page!

Diary

With your online diary it's very easy to write a quick note about what you've been doing each day. Each diary entry can be seen by the whole world, or you can control who sees it. To start adding to your diary, sign in and click on the 'Diary' link on your profile page. Click on the 'Add Event' link at the top of the page and you're away.

When you add an event, the controls will automatically be set to todays date. Because the date in one time zone could be different to the date in another time zone we recommend that you select your time zone. You'll only need to do this once, and can be done by clicking on the 'Time Zone' link at the top of the page.

Once you've added a number of entries to your diary, you'll notice that your profile page will display a maximum of 10 events prior to whatever todays date is.

For individuals we recommend care is taken in describing where you will on future dates as this could compromise your security. On the other hand, for business users advertising future dates in your diary could be a great idea for promoting special events.

To edit or delete a diary entry click on the date label, either on your profile page, or from your diary page. Again you must be signed in before you can do this.

Account   (Available after signing in)

In the account section you can change your password. For the best security we recommend that your password is as long as possible, and contains numbers as well as letters.

You can also change your email address here. When you change your email address we will send you an email so that we can verify your new email address. Once it has been verified then you will be able to use it when signing in.

Profile : View   (Available after signing in)

When you click on ‘Profile’ link near the top right of the page you will see a view of your profile page. After you edit your profile, you will probably want to click on the ‘View’ link to view the changes.

Billion7 relies on advertising revenue for further development, which is why your profile contains advertisements. Google Ads will pick up on text in your profile, and so the advertisments are more likely to be relavent to you.

Profile : Basic Settings   (Available after signing in)

In this section you'll find some of the settings you entered when you registered on billion7. If you get married and your lastname changes don't forget to update your name. It's also important keep your location up-to-date, in case people search billion7 for people living in your area.

Don't forget to select your gender after registering. This will be used for social searches.

Profile : Text Messages   (Available after signing in)

This is where you can set up secure messages and information about yourself, or perhaps leave messages for your contacts. There are four separate areas for your use and you can choose from the ‘Viewable By’ drop down menu, who you want to be able to see the information or messages you leave. These message or ‘Information’ areas are completely free form and can contain as much information as you want.

Profile : Contact Settings   (Available after signing in)

This section if for letting people know how you can be contacted. Enter your screennames and phone numbers, and specify who can see them. Unless you are advertising a business we recommend that phone numbers are only made viewable to your contacts, rather than to everyone.

When you select the 'Custom...' setting in the phone settings, a new box will appear and you will be able to create your own label for a phone number. To delete a screenname or phone number just delete all of the text in the box which contains the screenname or number and then click on the 'Save' button at the bottom of the page.

Profile : Social Settings   (Available after signing in)

This is where you can share with everybody, your interests and hobbies. You can also add any personal details about yourself, who you are, and what you're looking for.

It is completely free form and don't forget what you put in this area can be seen by all, so please be respectful of others and be careful of putting anything that may offend.

Profile : Work Settings   (Available after signing in)

This is where you can put all your work and professional details. It has separate fields for your occupation and skills.

Putting information in this area is useful if you want to have people in the same profession or line of work contacting you. If you are looking for work you may want to put details of what you are looking for so that others who may be looking, know your situation.

Once again don't forget, the information you put here can be seen by all.

And remember to save what you have entered.

Profile : Photos   (Available after signing in)

You can upload up to 6 photographs. Uploading a photo can take a few minutes, and the time it takes will depend on the size of the photo and the speed of your internet connection.

Once the photo has been successfully uploaded you will be able to add a title, a description, and with the ‘Viewable By’ option, set who can see the photo. These options must be saved by clicking on the save button at the bottom of the page.

By clicking on the 'Profile Picture' link under a photo, you can choose which photo will appear on your profile page.

Profile : Theme   (Available after signing in)

This is where you can personalize your profile, by choosing different backgrounds for your buttons or text.

Play around with the different themes until you find one that you like, and don't forget to 'Save' at the end.

Profile : Privacy   (Available after signing in)

This is potentially one of the most important sections of your billion7 profile, as this area allows you to determine who can or cannot contact you or see certain pieces of information about you.

Email Messages: This section allows you to configure exactly who you want to be able to receive e-mail's from.

My Contact List: When people carry out searches on billion7 one of the automatic options for information they can see about you are your contacts. Therefore if you don't want anyone to be able to see who is on your contacts list then configure your ‘Viewable By’ option accordingly.

Other Peoples Contact Lists: If I were to do a name search on ‘John’ for example, I would have displayed a list of all Johns that were registered. I could then look at a profile and one of the options I would be presented with is a list of their contacts. However, although I may be one of Johns contacts, if I select the - ‘I am hidden in other peoples contacts lists’ box, then I would not appear in their contact list. Neither would my profile picture appear.

For all users between the ages of 13 and 18 billion7 would strongly suggest that your settings are, for:

• Email messages - Only allow messages from my contacts
• My Contacts List – Viewable By ‘My Contacts’ or ‘Just Me’
• And tick the - I am hidden in other peoples contacts lists box.

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