The New York Times has a good piece on the use of Facebook by the elderly and isolated. LIRNEasia qualitative and quantitative research shows that plain old voice telephony and SMS keep people at the BOP connected and keeps them going on.

But Ms. Rice, 73, is far from lonely. Housebound after suffering a heart attack two years ago, she began visiting the social networking sites Eons.com, an online community for aging baby boomers, and PoliceLink.com (she is a former police dispatcher). Now she spends up to 14 hours a day in online conversations.

“I was dying of boredom,” she said. “Eons, all by its lonesome, gave me a reason to keep on going.”