Fairmont State University Professor of Education Richard Pierce is spending his summer delving into the on-line social network phenomena. He's teaching an on-line class for WVU on Facebook and how it’s impacting the world.

Pierce was a guest Tuesday on MetroNews Talkline. "Facebook represents a combination of several disciplines that are being taught in higher education including psychology, sociology, advertising."

Pierce says it’s his role to stay neutral in the 'friend or foe' argument surrounding the social network. But with 100 million user logging on each day, more and more people are seeing it as a tool to keep in touch with those who they might otherwise stop contacting. "It's providing a bridge in terms of off-line relationships, in the case of, for example, high school students who are moving to college. They now have an easy mechanism to remain in contact with their high school friends,” Professor Pierce said.

But Facebook is not just for teens. "The fastest demographic growing in Facebook are people between 35 and 50. And so some people are predicting an exodus of the younger people from Facebook as the adults move in,” he said.

The average Facebook user has 120 'friends.' Pierce says Facebook is the hot social network of the moment. "As Facebook continues to grow in popularity, it's catching up with MySpace in terms of overall membership. Twitter is rapidly catching Facebook. So all aspects of our life tend to be going on-line,” he said.