Facebook Now Useful Tool for Hookers

So Facebook is essentially a seedy motel in Times Square now, what with the spammers crowding your wall and all the prostitutes hanging out. Because according to a Columbia sociology professor, Facebook is the new Craigslist for hookers. So -- Facebook can't deal with arty nude drawings, but prostitution is A-OK?

The professor, Sudhir Venkatesh, studied 290 prostitutes and found that 83% of them used Facebook to advertise their wares. First of all, that's a small sample so...something something. It's not that surprising that hookers would turn to the Book, but it is pretty surprising that Mark Zuckerberg and his prude army wouldn't do a better job policing this.

Not to be a prude myself, but it's not really a good look to have prostitution happening on Facebook. Craigslist was whatever, but Facebook is for stalking, inviting people to events, and avoiding friend requests from relatives.

Related: "What's Facebook?" is totally a question that still needs to be asked on online polls. Everyone go to the Daily News article right now and vote "What's Facebook?" over and over again, so it looks like there's a huge segment of the population that's sitting around scratching their heads over this Face Book thing and wondering what all the hookers are doing there.

[rgray@villagevoice.com] [@_rosiegray]