Trading is not a zero sum game. It doesn't matter if nothing's being made, that's not the point. It's an important service providing pricing and liquidity which facilitates capital allocation, diversification, and risk management. Trading is an absolutely essential part of the economy.
As a simple example, a farmer hedges his wheat crop selling wheat futures. That allows him to reduce some of his risk, thereby allowing him to plant more (i.e. growing the economy). The market marker who bought the wheat futures may be trading multiple commodities. This trade diversifies his risk, allowing him to trade more of other commodities, allowing other farmers to offset more of their risks (i.e. growing the economy). Investment companies or hedge funds enter the market purchasing futures, to diversify their risks, allowing them to invest more in equity markets, which fund companies (i.e. growing the economy).
If my point isn't already clear, markets and trading facilitate the diversification and allocation of risk capital to market participants thereby growing the economy. It's the conduit for capital which does make something.
The entirety of your assertion is specious, but there's little value in debating it. The simple fact is that when a user closes their account, they should, at a minimum, be offered the ability to hide their profile from display. Ideally, they would be offered the ability to delete the entirety of their profile data. Facebook, as a company, is effectively stalking every man, woman, and child on the face of this planet. That is not a feature, no matter how much twisted double-speak you employ to justify their actions.
Whether you sympathize with her plight or think she's ridiculous, one important issue remains for all Facebook users. Even if you quit using Facebook, there's no assurance that Facebook will stop collecting data on you, and there's no assurance that Facebook will purge data pertaining to you from their database and website. In fact, it appears that your absence does nothing to curtail their data collection, nor their fictional representation of you. That is extremely problematic. Ideally ending one's account would end the data collection and the data profile. Failing that, at a minimum, one's personal data should no longer be displayed. Unfortunately Facebook's "security" policy seems indifferent to the real-life well-being and personal security of their current and former users.
Yes, the industry has been decimated. But what has also happened is that new, much smaller companies have sprung up to take the place of the old companies, buying out their manufacturing assets at pennies on the dollar.
Regardless, probably one of the coolest aspects of analog photography is the fact that you can make all your own materials (e.g. pinhole camera, albumen print, etc.) There are also photography companies that cater to the DIY/maker crowd. Photographers Formulary is a great place to get pretty much everything you need for film developing and printing. http://stores.photoformulary.com/
For the hardcore photography geeks, two good reference books.
"It's not a different art form, it is just an evolution of it."
I would agree that it's not a different art form. However I would strongly disagree that digital photography represents any kind of evolution. Digital photography is simply a new tool, nothing more, nothing less. It has its own aesthetic, process, and result.
The vast majority of people take terrible pictures and are undoubtedly better off with digital. It's quicker, it's cheaper, and it's easier. But when talking about a skilled photographer and printer, the differences between digital and analog become more apparent. Digital looks like digital, and analog looks different.
For your average snapshot, digital probably yields better average results. But in my opinion, I've not seen a gallery quality digital print that I thought matched the quality of the best analog prints. Digital looks strange to me, especially at larger sizes. (I think it might have something to do with the way edges get rendered.) That's just my subjective taste, others might prefer digital. I certainly don't hate digital, I just don't like it as much.
Regardless, I think the important point is that photography is an aesthetic art form, and therefore you are going to have people that prefer one or the other aesthetic. It's not a question of good or bad, they're just different. To say that "There is literally nothing that film cameras can do that digital camera's can't do, and in most cases do better" I think misses the ultimate point. The thing that digital hasn't been able to do, is look like analog.
P.S. Regarding your specious analogy of wood fire versus gas flame, if you can't tell the delicious, smokey difference between grilling over a wood fire versus a gas grill then I would suggest that your obsession with ease of use is just as ridiculous as someone obsessed with nostalgia.
In short, while returns for the May to October period may on average be less, they are positive and if anything, the returns for this period have been increasing. The one notable exception being the incredible selloff in 2008. Taxes are a more consistently important issue to consider.
As a simple example, a farmer hedges his wheat crop selling wheat futures. That allows him to reduce some of his risk, thereby allowing him to plant more (i.e. growing the economy). The market marker who bought the wheat futures may be trading multiple commodities. This trade diversifies his risk, allowing him to trade more of other commodities, allowing other farmers to offset more of their risks (i.e. growing the economy). Investment companies or hedge funds enter the market purchasing futures, to diversify their risks, allowing them to invest more in equity markets, which fund companies (i.e. growing the economy).
If my point isn't already clear, markets and trading facilitate the diversification and allocation of risk capital to market participants thereby growing the economy. It's the conduit for capital which does make something.