Photo: Andrew Braithwaite

In 2009, the Pew Internet Trust published a survey worth resurfacing for what it says about the significance of Facebook. The study was inspired by earlier research that "argued that since 1985 Americans have become more socially isolated, the size of their discussion networks has declined, and the diversity of those people with whom they discuss important matters has decreased."

In particular, the study found that Americans have fewer close ties to those from their neighborhoods and from voluntary associations. Sociologists Miller McPherson, Lynn Smith-Lovin and Matthew Brashears suggest that new technologies, such as the internet and mobile phone, may play a role in advancing this trend.

If you read through all the results from Pew's survey, you'll discover two surprising things:

1. "Use of newer information and communication technologies (ICTs), such as the internet and mobile phones, is not the social change responsible for the restructuring of Americans’ core networks. We found that ownership of a mobile phone and participation in a variety of internet activities were associated with larger and more diverse core discussion networks."

2. However, Americans on the whole are more isolated than they were in 1985. "The average size of Americans’ core discussion networks has declined since 1985; the mean network size has dropped by about one-third or a loss of approximately one confidant." In addition, "The diversity of core discussion networks has markedly declined; discussion networks are less likely to contain non-kin – that is, people who are not relatives by blood or marriage."

In other words, the technologies that have isolated Americans are anything but informational. It's not hard to imagine what they are, as there's been plenty of research on the subject. These technologies are the automobile, sprawl and suburbia. We know that neighborhoods that aren't walkable decrease the number of our social connections and increase obesity. We know that commutes make us miserable, and that time spent in an automobile affects everything from our home life to our level of anxiety and depression.

Indirect evidence for this can be found in the demonstrated preferences of Millenials, who are opting for cell phones over automobiles and who would rather live in the urban cores their parents abandoned, ride mass transit and in all other respects physically re-integrate themselves with the sort of village life that is possible only in the most walkable portions of cities.

Meanwhile, it's worth contemplating one of the primary factors that drove Facebook's adoption by (soon) 1 billion people: Loneliness. Americans have less support than ever -- one in eight in the Pew survey reported having no "discussion confidants."

It's clear that for all our fears about the ability of our mobile devices to isolate us in public, the primary way they're actually used is for connection.

On average, the size of core discussion networks is 12% larger amongst cell phone users, 9% larger for those who share photos online, and 9% bigger for those who use instant messaging.

The Pew study is full of factoids like this one. Bloggers are more likely to have confidants of a different race, people who upload photos online are 61% more likely to have a confidant with different political views, etc.

Humans are a social species, and we will use any outlet we're offered to connect with one another. Cultural shifts, the flight to the suburbs and our short-sighted investments in fossil-fuel based infrastructure put up barriers to social connections that we are only now coming to grips with. For all the hand-wringing over how we connect online, it's clear that the one unalloyed good social networks have accomplished is a net increase in our interdependence.

The question worth asking is: How did it occur to a generation raised in the suburbs that they could have the kind of civic life that can only be achieved in people-centered neighborhoods? Isn't it possible that in the 21st century we expect more of our physical environments because that kind of connectedness is what we've come to expect from our our virtual ones?

Zuckerberg (Photo: Scoble)

Farhad Manjoo has pointed out that for Facebook to maintain its share price, it needs to figure out how to increase its revenue by a factor of ten. Going from $5 per user per year in advertising revenue to $50 per user per year is about as likely as Facebook going from 1 billion users to 10 billion, which I suppose is the other way the company could increase revenue proportionally, even if it requires an alternate Earth's worth of additional human beings.

So! Either this IPO is, as the Wall Street Journal has suggested, the biggest shell game in the history of stock offerings, pushed along by those who want to cash out their shares in the company at the expense of unsophisticated investors who are piling on, or Facebook has a plan.

I don't think Facebook actually has a plan. I think it's the new AOL. But if it did have a plan, this is what it would look like.

Facebook Must Become A Bank

Forget Square, the credit card processing dongle for mobile devices produced by a company headed by Twitter alum Jack Dorsey. What the payments industry needs is a fast follower with serious reach and the desire to vanquish every other player in this space.

Or, as Dan Hon, interactive creative director at Wieden and Kennedy recently told me, "It would be really interesting if Facebook launched a credit card. In fact, it would be terrifying."

Facebook already has a credits system designed to fuel the compulsive addictions that afflict some of its users (and which are otherwise known as games like FarmVille). Tim Carmody did a good job of explaining the possible scenarios for an expanded credits system, but that's not what I'm talking about.

The appropriate analogy is Apple and iTunes.

"iTunes has so much credit card information that if they weren't such a singly focused company you could imagine them taking on the retail banking business, and Apple-ifying it." says Hon.

An Apple-style stunningly easy and simple to use payments system has the potential to take over, but the result would be something that only worked in one way -- as the ghost of Steve Jobs intended it. Facebook's take on this system would probably be a lot less tightly controlled (and not nearly as inspired). There's also the small matter that, unlike Apple and Amazon, Facebook doesn't have your credit card -- yet.

Under Zuckerburg's leadership, Facebook remains a surprisingly nimble company, considering its size. But as Manjoo points out, going public means, inevitably, bowing to the pressures of shareholders, who want their money's worth. Look for Facebook to acquire Square -- or try to kill it. Or, if they're really savvy, make a lateral shift on a scale of Apple's entrance into the phone market.

Disney has a new technology, called Touche, that can turn any object, including the human body, into a touch-sensitive surface that recognizes not only when contact has been made, but what kind of contact it is. Plenty of places have covered the details of how this technology works -- which are fascinating. But I have to admit that what should have been the most exciting part of Disney's presentation on Touché -- the use cases -- left me flat. (It starts at 2:50 in the video above.)

So here are five use cases that could transform this technology from an interesting oddity to something potentially transformative.

1. Goodbye Keyboards

Texting is slow, voice recognition isn't suitable for every context, and if you think a generation raised on iPads is going to know how to touch type, I've got a roomful of "state of the art" computer mice I'd like to sell you.

But what if we could use the Touche technology to replace keyboards with a technology that has for too long been relegated to the backwaters of technology: Chording.

Chorded keyboard allow touch typing without all the carpal tunnel syndrome

Chorded keyboards let you do wacky things, like tap out emails on handlebars while riding a bicycle, which Steve Roberts accomplished as early as 1986. Now imagine that you're entirely liberated from all input devices -- because the input device is your own body.

In a kind of gestural interface, there's no reason you couldn't tap out letters in rapid succession by chording them, fingertips against palm, in your own (empty) hand. Want to write an email? Hook up your augmented reality glasses and go for a walk.

2. Truly Wearable Computing

One use case Disney's video does explore is a limited form of wearable computing. In the example they give, the user is controlling his portable music player via taps and swipes on his own arm. But imagine he had an even richer gestural interface -- there's literally nothing you couldn't do in terms of interfacing with a computer.

The trick, of course, is coming up with a gestural interface that is fast but not error-prone. Would it resemble sign language, but with more touching? Clearly, there's room for someone to invent the QWERTY of touch-based, body-centric gestural interfaces.

3. Sketch Anywhere

A tiny projector in your augmented reality glasses, plus surfaces wired for touch, plus a human body wired for Touché style touch interfaces could turn any surface into a drawing surface.

4. Secure Transactions

Imagine a secret handshake that you share only with the touch pad at any cash register. This unique sequence of swipes, pokes, elbow touches -- whatever -- would be more secure than what we employ in the US now, a signature, which has got to be the most pathetic excuse for security theater going. (Those signatures aren't even used by your bank, which is why in most transactions they've been eliminated.) 

5. Sex

Is there any more obvious application of an interface that requires you to touch yourself, and which could trigger all kinds of events when you touch others?

Got more ideas about how Touché could be used, either in concert with the human body or on surfaces that weren't previously wired for touch? Leave them in the comments.

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