Homophily: Positive or Negative?

As an amateur linguist (or at the very least, a lover of language), I'm going to start off by saying the word "homophily" pleases me. It roughly translates to something like "loving (philos) the same thing (homo)." The article on homophily takes a stance counter to the other two sources, which both accuse the clustering effect of social networks of lessening out knowledge about the world. Clive Thompson writes that a small group of close-knit friends will provide a better flux of novel information than would a large group of acquaintances, based mostly on the fact that close friends know how to speak to you; this clearly applies IRL, so it would make sense that it would work online, too.

The NYBooks article and the video both present views that say staying within your own limits and comforts is bad, that it will prevent you from finding out new information. Specifically, they address this using the example of the google algorithm for providing people with tailored search result; the video brought up a quote that, summed up, says we shall soon experience only information that has been custom-suited for us. There is no longer a "standard" like there is in an encyclopaedia online. Google calculates which results to show us based on our browsing history, our browser, what type of computer we are using, and various other elements. No two people will get the same results, basically. However, as the Clive Thompson article says, this doesn't exactly mean that we are getting treated unfairly by the mighty Google. People are social. They discuss things they see online with each other-- if I strike up a conversation about something I saw online, and my friend replies using knowledge they learned on their side of the internet, we have already exchanged valuable information in a more applicable, real-world way than having read it online.

The filtering becomes dangerous when websites like Facebook do it. Google filters out the entire web for us, customizing its search results to include things that we, specifically, would find useful. Facebook filters out our FRIENDS' posts based on our internet activity. The second prospect is much worse to me than the first (but perhaps that is because I've become what Steve Jobs warned about: a person more concerned with a squirrel in the backyard than what goes on in other nations). The reason the Faceook situation worries me so much, though, is that this foreign entity- the CEOs and SEOs of Facebook- this faceless, anonymous bureaucracy- is taking over MY personal life. Yes, whatever you put on the web is in a sense open to the public (no matter what your privacy settings say), it is in spirit a "personal" social network. I don't like the idea of some looming presence shutting friends out of my life because they post conservatively and I liberally. If they matter enough to be on my friends list, I want them on my newsfeed. If i didn't, I'd remove them personally. We don't need Facebook doing that for us.