I'm sorry, but is this really just a handful of anecdotes about individual people who have stopped using Facebook? And this proves what, exactly? Every successful site has had people along the way that stopped using it for one reason or another.
Come back when you have some data on either the number of people leaving or the impact of their absence.
I think the data won't be so easy to collect. I think about 2/3 of my 'friends' have just stopped using it. Their profiles are still up, maybe they sign on once in a while to see if an old friend is trying to contact them. Frankly the article corresponds exactly with my experience.
A poll by an external agency wouldn't be very representative of Facebook's population, so Facebook is the only organization that has access to data to accurately make these kinds of claims, which they're going to hold very close to their chest.
Therefore, the obvious easy way to collect this data is to wine and dine some Facebook statisticians :D.
Could it be the times has an issue with facebook? As has been pointed out by other commenters there is no real evidence to suggest a facebook exodus but could this be a subtle message to readers that a facebook exodus is a desirable outcome?
I hereby proclaim my NY Times boycott. After reading this article, the boohoo about the former $225k/year SVP now out of a job, and that op-ed a while back whining about the iphone, it's become clear to me that the NYTimes is essentailly a troll writing about trending topics angling for unpopular opinions to gain readership.
"He says, not entirely in jest, that he considers it a repressive regime akin to North Korea, and sells T-shirts with the words 'Shut Your Facebook.' What especially galls him is the commercialization and corporate regulation of personal and social life."
What I find to be sad is the number of people over 50 STARTING to use Facebook. People who have spent 50+ years interacting with other humans in real life have decided, all of a sudden, that they prefer the anonymity of Facebook.
What does this really say about human interactions?
Is it overrated?
Have people simply been "putting-up-with" dealing with people in real life forever because they had no other choice?
I find it sad that the older generation is abandoning their long-lived ways of actually interacting in real life.
PERSONALLY: I hope the next generation starts a movement of abandoning this artificial way of interacting.
They don't prefer anonymity -- that is Facebook's USP, that it is real people who you actually know.
My mom uses it to keep in touch with family. It is easier for her than email, since she gets locked out of her email account every few years and loses her addressbook (like most of the people in it). However, Uncle Steve will always be Uncle Steve on Facebook.
There's something new and exciting for her about people she cares about every day -- a new photo of someone's baby, another picture uploaded from that wedding she couldn't attend, news that a cousin's son got accepted to Yale.
(Noteworthy for the discussion: my family is strewn all over the globe, and my has medical reasons which prevent her from seeing everyone as much as she would like. From her perspective its not more artificial than the telephone or letters, but it is a heck of a lot more convenient.)
Facebook is not anonymous. That is enforced and by design, and fairly important in distinguishing it from other social networks. The rest of your points are still fair though.
I'm an over-fifty user of Facebook, and I've noticed that a lot of my friends (some over fifty, and some not) have figured out how to fake their names in various ways. Among my friends, it is more often women than men who go by fake names, for the usual Internet security concerns that women have about cyberstalkers.
Come back when you have some data on either the number of people leaving or the impact of their absence.