Re: Congrats to Tim...
Doctor Syntax,
No it isn't. If you break windows then repair them, at the end of the day you have the same thing, mended windows.
Before Facebook you didn't have the benefit of the fun [spit!] you get using Facebook. Seeing as Facebook has replaced certain activities for some people, by definition it has increased their overall utiltiy. But their costs have remained the same, as it's not costing them anything. Therefore there's a consumer surplus in there somewhere, although it's impossible to measure.
If charging 10c an hour to use FB made people go back to watching telly, or scratching their arses, or whatever they did with that time beforehand - then we'd be able to value it at 10c an hour. Quite a hard experiment to do though.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
