As housing officials at colleges around the country send out roommate assignments to freshmen this summer, a growing number of schools say they're getting more requests for changes - from parents who don't like the roommates' Facebook profiles.

"They were getting an impression - false or accurate - of what the student would be like to live with," says Magda Manetas of The College of New Jersey in Ewing.

About a dozen other colleges contacted by USA TODAY report similar complaints. And this may be just the beginning: Some schools already have mailed roommate assignments for fall, but many more say they will be sending them out in the next few weeks.

Housing officials say parents who cite Facebook most frequently mention party-related content and photos as their primary concerns. Parents sometimes see cups in photos and make the leap to alcohol and drugs, Manetas says.

But Robin Berkowitz-Smith of Syracuse University says race, religion and sexual orientation are the top three concerns from parents contacting officials there.

In a brilliant marketing move to kick this off, Facebook is donating the February net proceeds from the virtual gifts to charity. After that, they're keeping the money. I would expect this to be a significant revenue generator for them by year-end.

The reason I say this is because "poking" is already such a big activity on Facebook, where you reach out to other users. When you pay money to do the same thing, it will mean more, and people will be sucked into doing it. If and when Facebook launches premium gifts, people will be buying those, too. I'd also expect them to sell really high end "limited edition" icons as well in limited supplies.

Take an inside look at the teamwork, practice, disappointments and rewards of competing on an Intercollegiate Horse Show Association (IHSA) team in Delaware Valley College freshman Sara Gumbiner's Riding through College blog on EquiSearch.com.

Born in Somerset, N.J., Sara is working toward an equine studies degree, while riding on both the hunt seat and western IHSA teams and adjusting to college life. Follow the 18-year-old freshman as she attends tryouts, runs for a team officer position and rides toward her goal of competing with her team at IHSA Regionals and Zones.

From Greek life to local bands to the big game, you can watch, upload, and share what's up, all on YouTube.

All you need to get in is a .edu email address from your college! If you signed up on YouTube with a different email address, you can change it when you join.

Reporters Without Borders today condemned the sudden disappearance on 28 July of two blogs by leading Tibetan poet Woeser (also known as Oser and, in Chinese, Wei Se). They were shut down by the websites that hosted them - Tibetcul.net, a Tibetan cultural portal, and Daqi.com, a local blog platform - presumably on government orders amid a continuing wave of online censorship in China.

"We are appalled by the closure of Woeser's blogs and we call for them to be reopened," the press freedom organisation said. "As her poetry is banned in China, these blogs were the only way she had left to express herself. Their disappearance shows how the Chinese authorities go out of their way to limit Tibetan culture to folklore for tourists."

Reporters Without Borders added: "Political control of the Chinese Internet is becoming more and more strict. The Chinese search engines recently updated their word filters while chat forums have been closed on government orders. We again appeal to the Chinese authorities to respect freedom of expression, a right guaranteed under their constitution."

Results indicate that 43 percent of the students that completed the survey spend 10 hours or more a week on the internet. Google, Yahoo and Myspace are the most visited sites. Sixty-two percent of the students that completed the survey download photos; 24 percent of the students participate in online bulletin boards, groups or chats.

Twenty-two percent of the students write blogs. With regards to advertisements that are displayed online, 40 percent of the students are more likely to respond to an advertisement that is humorous while 28 percent prefer fact-based advertisements.

"College students spend the majority of their time on the internet as opposed to other mediums and their usage behaviors have evolved," says Jennifer Floren, founder and CEO of Experience Inc. "They no longer just surf websites, rather they now use [the internet] to communicate with peers, conduct research, share photos and view videos. As a result, advertisers have a much greater opportunity to reach 18- to 24-year-olds online in a far more meaningful way."

From large public schools such as Western Kentucky to smaller private ones like Birmingham-Southern and Smith, colleges around the country have revamped their orientation talks to students and parents to include online behavior. Others, Susquehanna University and Washington University in St. Louis among them, have new role-playing skits on the topic that students will watch and then break into smaller groups to discuss.

Facebook, geared toward college students and boasting 7.5 million registered users, is a particular focus. But students are also hearing stories about those who came to regret postings to other online venues, from party photos on sites such as Webshots.com to comments about professors in blogs.

"The particular focus is the public nature of this," said Tracy Tyree, Susquehanna's dean of student life. "That seems to be what surprises students most. They think of it as part of their own little world, not a bigger electronic world."

The sites actually help with one of the major goals of orientation: bonding. At Birmingham Southern, dozens of members of the incoming class of about 350 had already formed a Class of 2010 Facebook group long before the start of school.

"That's great," said Renie Moss, the school's dean of students. "That's what should be happening, forming that camaraderie. But we're hoping to just maybe give the students a moment to pause and make sure they put out something they can be proud of."