My involvement with Facebook is a big positive for me. I've been on Facebook for about 10 years. I have a lot of people all over the world that I want to stay in touch with... family, friends from high school and college, former work friends, friends from my travels (including several hundred from our groups), former students. It would be impossible for me to maintain contact with many of these people otherwise, and I enjoy keeping up with their lives.
Just one example. My father passed away recently, and I was able to let friends know about this. I received over 300 messages as a result. I can't tell you how much all this meant to me. In today's world (and especially with a network of friends around the world), otherwise, most would not have known. Likewise, I appreciate knowing when something good or sad happens to my friends. Facebook provides a good way to keep us connected.
Another example. My niece is a working mom with three children. She doesn't have time to write me or send me photos by email, but through Facebook I can stay in touch with her and watch her kids grow up. I also know more about what my sister and brother are doing.... and occasionally my daughter too!
Pauline, I like knowing about your trips and your walks and other bits of your life when I see your posts in FB. (So please don't stop posting!!)
I would rather posts about my travels on Facebook because it reaches a broader audience of my friends than those I can reach through forums like this. If someone isn't interested, they can unfollow me, ask to "see less of Kathy," or I think if they never like or comment on a post, they won't see mine.
I'm involved in several groups and like these a lot. I'm in groups for my high school and college classes, some groups of friends, a few special-interest groups. My extended family has a group so we can communicate privately when we want. We have hundreds of old family photos on our family Facebook page. My high school class planned our reunion through our Facebook group.
I do get news through Facebook. I follow several publications that interest me and have selected to see these first in my news feed. I have several national publications and a few local, even a few outside the USA. I just see a little blurb in my newsfeed and I can choose whether to go read or not. This way I don't have to check every publication every day, and I also can see breaking news. There are a couple of public people whose posts I like, and I follow those.
I use FB in my business. I run two business-related pages and get a fair amount of interaction. It's a good way to share information of interest and to keep people involved if they want to be (and many do). I've actually gotten a few bookings through Facebook.
I have learned to block posts and people that I don't want to see. I've reported a few posts over the years. I can move quickly past ads and I note those that I don't want to see.
For me, the good of FB outweighs the other issues, and I feel sure that the company will continue to work to address these.