Beyond SOCIAL Networking

What both Scruton and Cowen failed to discuss was the other uses of Facebook. Today Facebook goes beyond interactions beyond friends. It is used for many other reasons, including company pages, contests, surveys, etc. Examples would be local radio shows that hold Facebook only contests to win prizes and opportunities to speak with celebrities (B105 held a Fbook chat with Ronnie Dunn the other week). My job is to create websites for local businesses, and every single one that I have done, the client asks for me to interlink their business website with their Facebook page, just because it makes finding people and letting people stay in touch with the business that much easier.

Personally, I hardly use Facebook for social interaction. I can't tell you the last time I wrote on someone's wall, and I usually just post interesting news articles. I'm one of those losers that participates in the contests, but with a smartphone, it does not require too much time out of my way to do this. The one reason I use Facebook anymore is to talk with my friend who is serving over in Iraq at the moment, without Facebook, we would not have any way of keeping in touch (the quantity and quality of our relationship would diminish)

But back to the other uses for Facebook. In my eyes, Facebook is not social interaction between me and my 'friends', but a means to keep in touch with the world as a whole. Examples: Moammar Gadhafi was killed today, and had I not been on Facebook seeing the news posts of others, I would not have known this until tomorrow probably on the radio. My girlfriend would not have won tickets to a concert if she hadn't been on Facebook, and I certainly would not have happy clients if I could not get their Facebook feed on their websites.

So my closing argument is that Facebook is not just for 'social interaction' (creeping), but has expanded that it is now useful for many more reasons that essentially make it good for all, even those who think that it degrades real life social interaction.