Once dominated by glossy brochures, college fairs, and campus tours, the college admissions landscape is rapidly shifting toward online social media, as schools blanket the Internet with podcasts, blogs, and videos to recruit wired high school students.

With virtual campus tours, live chats with college students, professors, and admissions officers, and videos about campus life, colleges and universities are increasingly turning to interactive and multimedia technology as recruiting tactics to connect with prospective students who are far more likely to scroll down a Web page than thumb through a college viewbook.

Prospective students can now instant-message recruiters and befriend them on Facebook, where scores of their future classmates are just a click away. They can take in classes on iTunes, tour campuses on YouTube, and create a profile on college websites to receive customized news a la Amazon.com.