I am a fan of blog feeds. It makes my world so much easier to just have one place to go to see what’s new with my friends instead of checking each of their individual blogs. However, one of the catches of blog feeds is that you can’t subscribe to blogs that are private. You have to go check each one of those individually, and generally with a user name and password. So I completely sympathized when one of my friends ranted on her blog about five people she knew who were taking their blogs private. But I also sympathized with those five friends, since I am also one of those private bloggers.

Fortunately, Family Says provides a silver lining for both the private and the friends of the private. Email notifications. Yes, regardless of whether you have a Family Reunion or a Basic Family Says plan, any author or guest will receive an email notification with a link to the new posting as soon as something new is added to your site. This feature can also be turned off by individual authors or guests if they desire. In order to receive email notifications, a user name and password is required to initially log into your site, but if cookies are enabled in your browser, your authors and guests can bypass the login step by clicking on the link included in the email.

It’s a wonderfully simple solution that keeps everyone happy without having to compromise privacy or staying in touch.

The Pew Internet and American Life Project has released a study about the impact of Internet and cell phone use on family communication.

Overall, the results indicate that the Internet has enabled families to draw closer together and strengthen their relationships:

One-third (33%) of online adults say that the internet has improved their connections with friends “a lot,” and nearly one-quarter (23%) say that it has greatly improved their connections with members of their family.

While the research isn’t always clear on the difference between Internet and cell phone usage, it offers some very interesting insights into how families use these technologies to their benefit.

Family blogs are just one way you can stay in touch with family and friends. This electronic medium can help solidify those family links even if you are physically very far apart.