I never used Facebook until I ended up as secretary of a sports club. It adds a lot of value for messages such as, "Could someone who regularly drives past the

I never used Facebook until I ended up as secretary of a sports club. It adds a lot of value for messages such as, "Could someone who regularly drives past the bottle shop please pick up a carton of beer and drop it off next time they come to the club rooms?" If you post that on Facebook, people read it a lot sooner than if it's on some group-specific message board. Then, whoever offers to do it gets to have the whole club see them volunteer. If you're trying to organise a community instead of just making money from its economy, then a semi-public space like Usenet or Facebook turns out to be really useful.