In working on the Online Publishing Update late last night, I stumbled across a few responses to an article about how much time people waste on Facebook. (Hint: It’s a lot of time).

For background, an article ran in Australian media outlets a little less than a week ago about workers’ productivity declining because people are spending time on Facebook instead of actually working. The first two sentences of the story:

“Facebook is shaping up as every boss' nightmare as the social networking Web site urges its members to hook up with workmates online. That means millions of corporate dollars could be lost as workers manage their online social life via Facebook, rather than being productive in front of the screen.”

Update Friday, Aug. 24: Just found this on TechDirt -- that the company that ran did the "study" was an Internet filtering company that measured the time employees spent on Facebook and assumed it was wasted time. Either way -- if it's spent or wasted -- Facebook is still a good place to hang out if you're working in digital media. My original post continues below now...

I’m going to politely disagree – at least for the digital media field. Perhaps if you’re in some industry that has no reason to be on Facebook (though I can imagine some stretched arguments for people in several fields to play with the site), I don’t think it’s a waste of work time at all.

Social media, which includes Facebook, MySpace, social bookmarking sites, YouTube, etc., has become the basis for Web 2.0. And we know from several studies that these Web 2.0 sites and networks are attracting young (and older) Web users like flies to honey.

As a newspaper online editor (or any digital media exec), you should be looking at these sites to figure out why everyone is playing with these sites. Further, you may want to find out how you can either Work with the sites’ capabilities or partnership programs to get your content in front of your target audience or incorporate some of the cool elements from these sites and networks into your own digital media outlet. Or do both!

Especially with Facebook platform, a ton of publications, digital media outlets and companies are working to gain access to consumers in creative ways. One I found last night: Neighborhoods on Facebook, which connects you to events and people living in your area. I bet newspapers could use this application to push some really localized news content to people on Facebook.

In addition, there are tons of networking opportunities: Digital media groups, alumni groups, localized industry groups, etc.

If you work in digital media and you are not “wasting” time on Facebook, MySpace and other Web 2.0 outlets – where your content consumers, potential content consumers and other digital media people are spending their time – you should be there.

If you’re interested, Ross Dawson has a quick round-up of responses to the original article.