What Facebook isn't

There has been a lot of flap in the media lately about how Facebook causes depression and social isolation, and how frustrated users are quitting in droves, etc. I agree that one of the most serious issues with FB is that it encourages people to post sensitive information such as birthdates and then leaks it to 3rd-part app developers, but as to the former two charges, the people who are complaining about those things have a fundamental misunderstanding of what Facebook ISN'T.

Facebook is not:

• a substitute for face-to-face interaction. I don't know anybody who would say "I can't go out with you tonight, I'm busy Facebooking." If you actually are addicted to FB that much that you forgo hanging out with friends in favour of it (not because you actually don't like your friends all that much, or have a legitimate reason like needing to talk online to overseas friends about something important), you probably have some kind of mental problem and would be addicted to something anyway.
• a substitute for e-mail. Not everybody checks Facebook regularly, whereas most people with access to the Internet check e-mail regularly. If you use it to contact someone whose activity level you don't know and they don't reply, it's your own fault. Also, posting on someone's Wall can be read by other people. If you need to contact someone privately you need to send them a message, not a wall post.
• a "serious" place. It's nice if you make a professional contact serendipitously, but it's not a good idea to friend your boss, professors, or coworkers unless you are on very good terms with them. And if you do, it might be a good idea to sort them into a group labelled "Coworkers" or something if you want to block them from seeing personal information, posts, notes, and photos. Best is to use a separate website for professional networking like LinkedIn or BiomedExperts.
• a private place. Think of it as hanging out with your friends in a coffeeshop flipping through magazines and looking at each others' digicams. You will be exposed to advertisments and other people's inane chatter. Other people can hear what you're talking about and see what you're reading, and sometimes see your photos if they're kaypoh. Of course, in real life this doesn't lead to people fleeing coffeeshops in droves, unlike what one might think if one took the newspaper pundits' complaints to their logical conclusion...

One thing that amuses me about social networking sites is that they have led to the use of "friend" as a verb instead of "befriend". Of course "friend" used to be grammatically incorrect and was used mostly by small children (as in "You stole my pencil, I don' wan' friend you any more!") but it seems to be segueing into legitimate use.