What is news? What is a friend? I don't have a clue to either question.
Maybe a question that is easier to answer is: Why do people read the news and have friends? The obvious answer: To connect.
And that means facebook kicks every news program's, every magazine's and every newspaper's ass. Nobody in their teens or 20s gives a rat's ass about what happened to Slobodan Milosevic. Offended by that statement? Then you're OLD! You're freaking old!!!!
Younger people want to connect with topics that have proximity. How are they going to connect with something happening on the other side of the world? They aren't. That's why they go to facebook and MySpace.When the media and communication experts once thought the Internet disconnected people from the world, facebook is doing just the opposite. It's making people addicted!
It's also making big money. Why else would Rupert Murdock, the William Randolph Hearst of today, spend $583 million for it? Because it gets results and will continue to get results.
Nearly 65 percent of facebook users log in at least once a day. I log in at least three times a day. That WILL change when I get out of college and the heck out of Kansas. I will still want to be connected with all my college buddies. Am I going to call all 286 of them everyday to see what is new? Hell no! Going on some stupid web site will be much easier.
News to me is what is happening around me. It is what's going on in my life. And my friends are in my life, not Milosevic. I'm not going to read about something 10,000 miles away. I'm going to connect to the things that are closest to me: my friends. And that's just a mouse click away.
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