“Johnnny, this is you,” my friend  Steve exclaimed yeterday.

It is me, but I was never a Facebook holdout. A year ago, I embraced Facebook immediately as a tool and find myself with  665 friends now. The majority are professional contacts and I am proud to say I know or knew most of them. Really. And in my freelance capacity now, I suspect they’ll prove invaluable (or valuable, depending on the way you say it).

Buddy and media-savvy Steve was referring to column in yesterday’s Boston Globe by an unemployed reporter who reluctantly signed up for Facebook . I’m not sure why he was so reluctant and I suspect the author was a good 2o-30 years younger than me. No matter. Covering technology which I’ve done most of my carrer makes one quick to embrace it.

Any journalist or marketer for that matter who ignores Facebook might as well be passing on the Internet. As a journalist for more than three decades, I’ve built up hundreds of valuable contacts and Facebook has reconnected me with many from the 80s and 90s who would otherwise have been lost to the vapors of the past.  Facebook will be indispenable until something comes along and replaces it. And I have  no doubt that will happen.

For now, I can live with a few Facebook downsides such as loss of privacy – a topic too extensive and murky to cover in this quick post. Facebook can be a royal time-waster especially when it comes to things addictive games. Whoops, gotta go! I need my Word Twist fix.