When reading through your comment I had a blast from the past and remembered how I was
browsing the "All-Seeing Eye" [1] to look for Quake 3 servers and then share them with friends via IRC.
Looking back at those times I remember the Internet as a much more social place (but that might be just be).
I think it's because people had to get active to use services for social interaction as opposed to getting
hit by a notification in your face.