Do you think facebook only facilitates superficial friendships or at least only the start of them?

[Cus]

Facebook is beneficial to all levels of friendship. Obviously, the better you get to know someone, the more experiences you're likely to share in person or cross over into texting, phone calls, IMs or email. Facebook just acts as a first line of defense/buffer zone for interacting with people with whom you're not comfortable yet or trying to track down after old connections fall through. It also has an incredibly voyeuristic appeal--that you can silently observe everything your friends do in real time is perhaps the greatest lure.

Additionally, it's an easy way to gather large groups of friends for discussion without trying to organize a multiple-person video chat or three-way call, which require real-time participation. This is particularly evident when you think about where Facebook originated--college. After graduating high school, a lot of people split up, move away, find themselves with conflicting schedules, and are too busy adjusting to new boundaries, environments, and lifestyles to set aside time for friendship like they used to.

Even with your best friends, it's an easy shorthand alternative to email when sharing interesting links, gossip, etc. mainly because you KNOW they're more likely to be lurking around Facebook than constantly checking email. It's an unfortunate truth--the more your friends get sucked in, the more you're sucked in. But hey, if you can avoid it, more power to you.