I'm not sure of the experiences from other early facebook adopting schools -- but my old school (Bowdoin College) was among the first -- and it's still like crack to them. Not as ridiculous as a few years ago, but it's still wickedly popular. And from my perspective the alum retention rate, as the article mentions, is very strong.
I think the genius of Facebook is not just the eliteness, but instead a new word I'll makeup called 'localness'. Facebook cordons off the scary, wild web and presents you with people that you know or could at least see yourself knowing or bumping into. Combine that with early entry into the social networking world, very strong and appealing UI, and yes, eliteness, and a few years later, you've got 18 million users.
I think the genius of Facebook is not just the eliteness, but instead a new word I'll makeup called 'localness'. Facebook cordons off the scary, wild web and presents you with people that you know or could at least see yourself knowing or bumping into. Combine that with early entry into the social networking world, very strong and appealing UI, and yes, eliteness, and a few years later, you've got 18 million users.