[faitswulff]

I'm going to dissent with the majority of commenters here and say yes, it provides a lot of value to its users. Why do you think so many startups are squashed because they're just subsets of Facebook functionality?

With the network effects of having over a billion people (and most of the developed world) on Facebook in mind, consider that all of these people now have free and highly functional voip/video calling wherever they have internet. They have a group and event management web apps with sophisticated privacy controls. Facebook also serves as an event and news discovery app. It's also an effective publishing platform, though the line between statuses and articles can be blurry.

Note that I'm not listing things that Facebook users can do, but things that I've seen Facebook users actively employ.

And all of this for the small (dollar) cost of giving up your email address and personal information. Which, for most people, as we've discovered, is an acceptable trade. Most people's personal information is not that valuable to them, given an agent that is trustworthy enough. Consider that most Americans give up their social security numbers on things as trivial as a job application.

In summary, outliers like HN commenters may disagree, but most people get a lot more value out of Facebook than they sacrifice.