I deactivated my Facebook page, much to my daughter’s great relief, I’m sure. I created an account to learn what it was, and I have to say I never really caught its wave. In the end, I guess it is a PHP-enabled blog server for people without the time or inclination to get into blog design, with some social networking tools enabled to help create, maintain, and encourage site traffic.

Facebook facilitates the sort of ‘virtual clubhouse’ that Howard Rheingold lucidly analyzed in ‘Smart Mobs‘ … a technology that provides a sense of privacy with one’s friends. And I understand the particular usefulness of that, particularly for teenagers still under the watchful eyes of parents and teachers and lacking the mobility or means to carve out much real-world personal space. (I’d say I grok it, if only to underscore that my Baby Boomer psyche left this particular experiment a long while ago, although I can still see why it is a tool so relevant for Generation Next).

The FaceBook application platform feels convoluted. It probably has to be to maintain their very-locked-down business model (services like Google AdSense won’t work within application pages, so ‘monetized’ applications seem either hamstrung or impossible).