If the OP said, "Facebook _helps_ keep me connected to folks I care deeply about who aren’t nearby," would that address your concerns? Because I think you're over-reading this specific sentence and assuming that it means that it's the primary means of communication. I don't think that's what the OP said or meant -- on the very next line he makes it clear that he means in the context of online, "It’s one of my very few “emotive” online experiences.
Even with my closest friends that I see every week, I don't run down the week's minutiae when we see each other, even though we might see/share it on FB. Tough commute to the office? Find an interesting article worth sharing? Bragging about the cocktail you're about to drink down? None of this stuff comes up every week, but I'm happy to Like or comment on them when I see them, and, yes, it does help keep me connected. And they're in the same city. I don't think any of this should be surprising.
Also, I contend that "semi-creeping" on friends of friends is not what "most" people use Facebook for. That may be what you and your friends use it for, but I think this all goes to the underlying crux of the OP's argument -- Facebook is a personalized experience that is very different for each person, depending on who they are, how they use it, and who their connections are, and he's happy with it.
Agreed with the last point here - I would be very surprised to find that 'most' people use facebook for that creeping the grandparent mentions. Perhaps most people in their personal social demographic? Perhaps just the poster?
I don't think those links are strong support for your point, which I understood to be that 'most people' use facebook for 'randomly clicking on that "cute girl that's a friend of a friend of a friend [but which I do not actually know]". The psych central article says that most people use facebook to look at specific people, as opposed to randomly clicking on unknown people. HuffPo also says that they are looking up people they already know.
I guess if your point was that most people use facebook to look at details of other people...well, I guess that's true, but it feels like saying the sky is blue, so I'm assuming you are trying to make a more specific argument?
I was mostly strengthening my first point ("seeing what X or Y is up to") -- to show that most people do not specifically foster the deep relationships OP was mentioning, but rather just see what random people (you may tangentially know) are up to.
Even with my closest friends that I see every week, I don't run down the week's minutiae when we see each other, even though we might see/share it on FB. Tough commute to the office? Find an interesting article worth sharing? Bragging about the cocktail you're about to drink down? None of this stuff comes up every week, but I'm happy to Like or comment on them when I see them, and, yes, it does help keep me connected. And they're in the same city. I don't think any of this should be surprising.
Also, I contend that "semi-creeping" on friends of friends is not what "most" people use Facebook for. That may be what you and your friends use it for, but I think this all goes to the underlying crux of the OP's argument -- Facebook is a personalized experience that is very different for each person, depending on who they are, how they use it, and who their connections are, and he's happy with it.