Indeed. There's nothing wrong with Facebook as an advertising channel, when used effectively and with expectations properly calibrated. There's a lot wrong wit

Indeed. There's nothing wrong with Facebook as an advertising channel, when used effectively and with expectations properly calibrated. There's a lot wrong with blindly throwing money at a Facebook "fan page" and an ostensible following, expecting miracles to happen and any of those followers to care. (There's also a problem involved in paying for the fans, then reaching a fraction of them with each update -- but that's the nature of how Facebook works, and that shouldn't have been a mystery to most marketers for quite some time now.) What we're experiencing right now isn't a "revolution" in advertising, as the article suggests. But then again, it's the marketers' fault for expecting there to have been one in the first place. They bought, traded, and sold the hype. Big brands made relatively blind, multi-million-dollar commitments to Facebook and other social channels before stopping to think about what, exactly, they were hoping to achieve. What those brands are learning today: there's no such thing as a magic bullet. There's no such thing as a free lunch. There's no such thing as a "revolution" in marketing. Nothing will allow you to grow a fanbase, increase engagement, and sell more products without an ounce of forethought and hard work. Facebook is a channel, like any other. It can be a very effective channel. But like any channel, it needs to be thought through, analyzed, and used properly. The blind honeymoon is over. The platform's usefulness remains.