Facebook explained.

"I like the low-pressure stay-in-touch ability it offers. Meaning, I would like to keep in touch with people and let them know that I'm thinking of them without having to engage in a time-consuming and potentially stilted conversation. It enables me to be friendly without fear of social awkwardness, when I can just poke someone or send them a jello shot. I really like the status update feature. It's concise and present-tense. So you stay updated on your friends' lives without having to actually talk to them.

"Plus, I've already become friends with 3 long-lost childhood friends, who I'm happy to know still exist on this planet, but I don't really have anything to say to them."

This was one response I got when I asked several friends what this Facebook thing was all about. I'm still not 100% sold, but this explanation definitely encourages me to play around more...

Or makes me want to run screaming to the hills at the utter lack of human contact our lives have resorted to.

One or the other.