[timwiseman]

Even social media solves problems (though admittedly much more minor ones than what you describe).

I had a problem keeping in touch with my extended family, Facebook has made this much easier.

I used to have issues with loosing touch with old friends (even ones you make a moderate effort to keep in touch with can become unreachable if you and they both move frequently), facebook helps.

Getting pictures of the kids distributed frequently without digital technology would have been difficult. Email made it substantially easier. Facebook makes it very easy.

I used to have a hard time finding resources for the game Go. Services like DragonGoServer let me play online and Google+ lets me find and talk to other Go enthusiasts.