It's a "who you know" list.

Buddies gives you a short list of friends or "buddies" on the site, and provide a route for you to meet friends of your friends. It is a lot like the "buddy" feature found on the old SGS site except it has more functions.

When you view someone's profile you will notice it also has a Buddies button and if you mouse over that menu there will be a drop down bar with a request button that let's you send a request to them.

Once they receive the request, they can approve it and then you show up on their list and they show up on your list. Use it for other members you already communicate with or know. For people you want to get to know, use private messaging instead.

If you look at your menu bar, mouse over My Profile and on the menu that drops down you will see My Buddies. Any buddies you add will be on the page linked to the My Buddies button and you can easily go to their profile without searching for it.

When you have made connections and you are visiting a profile you may notice something that says:

Your buddy connection path to person D ( 4 degrees ):

You-person A-person B-person C- person D

This will let you know how you are connected to someone else and how you are a part of the community here. So go ahead and make those buddies, meet new people and make new friends.