Jack Shafer has an interesting column today, but I don’t buy his central thesis:

For as long as anybody can remember, the newspaper has been the primary info-hub through which people interacted. … How many times have you heard a conversation start, “Didja see that article …”? … Other institutions do far better jobs at issuing social currency these days. What is Facebook but the Federal Reserve Bank of social currency? And it’s all social currency you can use! Like cocktail chatter, a Facebook posting—be it a link, a list, a photo, or travel plans—conveys the message, I am here. Listen to me. A well-executed Facebook presence, like a superb pontification at the bar or a great phone-in to sports talk radio, demonstrates one’s status within one’s existing social network.

I was one of the first people on Facebook (my school got it just a couple months after it started), and I can honestly say I’ve never noticed anyone’s social status change through well-managed work on the site. Facebook tends to reflect real-life social heirarchies — when you make friends in the real world, you “friend them” and send them messages on Facebook — without affecting them that much. Quite frankly, people who send out links constantly just annoy their friends, and while it’s nice to be able to see your buddies’ travel photos, it’s just that, nice.

In other words, Facebook is a network for interaction, but it does not replace the newspaper by providing the inspiration and content for that interaction.

Of course, Shafer is right that newspapers have been replaced by websites (just not Facebook). But that’s the same old boring story we’re all familiar with — people with disparate interests and viewpoints can all get their news from different sources now, and for free. The only problem (which Shafer’s framework shines no light on) is that while information might “want to be free,” reporters don’t want to dig it up for free, and unpaid bloggers aren’t willing to pick up phones, much less go out and cover stories. If news-collecting becomes unprofitable, there will be a lot less news.