Cars that drive themselves. Distributed power generation. Web connected sensors in everything. You know, things that have a material effect on people's quality of life. As opposed to Facebook.
It's important to realize that Facebook has done a tremendous job of connecting the non-digerati who previously communicated via infrequent mail or rare phone calls.
While I am very bearish on a 100 P/E, the reality of Facebook's userbase and its engagement is not something to blow off. Facebook has distinctly impressed itself on the communication modality of many many people.
> things that have a material effect on people's quality of life. As opposed to Facebook.
As much as I dislike Facebook, there is some scientific evidence that increasing one's social ties produces measurable improvements to health, including longevity. If Facebook increases social connectivity, which in my limited experience it does, it's not a stretch to suggest that it could materially improve one's quality of life.
My money's still on google though for the long run ...
>As much as I dislike Facebook, there is some scientific evidence that increasing one's social ties produces measurable improvements to health, including longevity.
Yes, increasing those ties in person. I have yet to see any evidence social media has the same effect.
Also, those studies may have the causality arrow going the wrong way. Sick people tend to stay at home and not get out much, so it may be that you're more likely to have social ties if you're healthy than the other way around.
>I have yet to see any evidence social media has the same effect.
Have you looked for these studies? Are you an expert on this corner of the literature?
There have been studies and they do show that internet socialization has an effect on a variety of relevant measurements. To summarize, Internet socialization is not equivalent to face-to-face socialization but it does provide some of the benefits and is also able to provide benefits that face-to-face cannot provide.
I find it strange how people such as yourself will make statements about the literature as if your opinion had value. Your opinion about the literature is only valuable if you have studied the literature. If you have not, then you should remain silent if you want to be a valuable contributor.
Anyone genuinely interested in these facts could check Wikipedia, Google Scholar, or a Google Books textbook and find copious citations.
To be perfectly honest, I find your behaviour more interesting than the actual topic.
Why do people who have clearly not exhaustively studied a particular field put forth their own ignorance as an argument in their favor?
"I'm an evangelical Christian who has never gone to university and I've never seen any evidence of evolution. My ignorance is a strong argument against evolution! I am going to use my ignorance as a bludgeon in this debate and make everyone else do all the work of digging up citations, which I won't read anyway."
Am I wrong in thinking this is a uniquely American form of entitled debating style? "Everyone has the right to spread their ignorant opinion" or something?
I believe that that evidence is based on close friends. I think Facebook tends to make it easier to maintain lots of light friendships, but doesn't do much for close friendships.
The entire internet population (or at least close to it) binded by one global network -- it's a mistake to think of Facebook as just another social network in the same league as Twitter, Foursquare, etc... rather, it's probably more useful to think of it as an alternative internet, or even an operating system.
Bill Gates and Paul Allen dreamed of putting a personal computer in every home in 1975, and that dream came true over the decades following. Facebook's dream is just beginning and we're going to see big waves in internet, media, telecom, and commerce over the next few decades.
