I don't necessarily disagree with everything you said. What you describe is part of that complex indirection I mentioned. But at the end of the day it's not definitions of "customer" that matter so much as what kinds of incentives this triangle structure comprising service provider, user and advertiser actually provides to each party. (As far as definitions go you could just as well say that users are merchandise in this case)

There is clearly a vested interest on the part of service providers to make users hand over control of as much data as possible, no matter if it's good or bad for them. How convenient that all of a sudden society has changed its attitude towards privacy, and users now _want_ service providers to help them share share share everything with everyone else.

I wonder where Mr. Zuckerberg's sociological studies may lead us next. Maybe society changes again and users want Facebook to send product recommendations in their name? It's such a hassle to maintain all those friendships manually. Clearly, we need help in feeding our friends with fresh, valuable information every day! How about an automated Friendfeed? ;-)