Facebook - the hype is justified

I have finally, somewhat behind the curve, started to use Facebook. Initially I intended to spend some time figuring out what the hype was about and whether it could be ruled out as a tool for advertising. It's proven to be a lot more fun than I expected and potentially, even, useful for advertising.

Almost a month into my tenure and it still seems that the hype is justified. It has sustained its addictiveness by being user friendly and useful. It has put me back in touch with people and allows for a very low maintenance method of communicating. Unlike My Space, my last attempt at 'social networking', it is pretty spam free and very searchable.

From an advertising point of view, there are a couple of angles. Banners on social networking sites have been much maligned and typically seem to be for online products of a dubious nature. There are, however, bound to be circumstances where Facebook's (substantial) inventory could be subdivided into useful segments. Advertising for University of Toronto events is often targeted to me. This happens to not be useful as I'm nowhere near the UofT campus, but I expect it is reaching a large proportion of those that are.

There are also occassional 'integrated messages'. Within my news feed (which summarises the various activities of my 'friends') there was an update today which read: "Harry and Voldemort have set their relationship status to "Mortal Enemies."" It's a playful, intelligently integrated reminder that the next wave of Harry Potter mania is on the way.

I've done a quick, unscientific, measure of Facebook users and graphed it (below). The graph represents the breakdown, by graduating year, of Facebookers from secondary schools in three different countries. I got the data by searching the database for numbers, by year, from my highschool and the schools of two of my colleagues (and friends). The sample is very small but is anecdotally illustrative nonetheless. Here are some generalisations:

Facebook is still primarily made up of people who are in education or have recently left it. Three quarters of the sample are in secondary education or have been in the last 4 years.

The spread into the generation older than those currently in education is more advanced in North America than in Europe.

The graph supports a theory that Facebook adoption, as it is driven by 'member get member', tends to occur in clumps. The popularity of the site varies significantly between different graduating years for the Italian and English schools, likely driven by individual social groups. For the Canadian school, where Facebook has more developed penetration, there's a more gradual trailing off. Individual social groups have little impact.