Let me count the ways.
Dave writes: “Facebook is absolutely correct that no new information is available now that wasn’t available before, but only in a theoretic sense.” So in a practical sense there is information available now that wasn’t before? No, not at all. Are people going to see more information now than they were seeing before? Some of them. Does that make the statement that people can see more only “theoretical”? No, it makes it false.
Then, of course, we have Dave’s example of a city, which is just a bad analogy. Here’s why: all 2,000 people are your friends (or that’s what you claim). You’ve already given all 2,000 of them permission to enter your yard an eat your fruit. Some people, though, are now saying “wait… if my friends are actually going to take advantage of that, I don’t want them to be my friends any more.”
The way that the user can keep things his changes from making his friends’ news feeds should’ve been advertised, yes, but a feature like news feed is only interesting if everyone is doing it. Opt in doesn’t work here. Under Dave’s system “Facebook Plus” would die a slow and painful death and those who want this nice feature wouldn’t get it.