I find mine very useful for E-Mail. I have my Gmail-hosted student account forwarding to my regular Gmail account so I get all the updates that I need. In HS, email isn't important, but college is a lot different.
It's nice to have access to the net when its hard to find a computer in the library.
I can also go on the full NS site on my Droid X and you can't tell me that isn't handy.
If I want to see if one of my friends is home, I text them. If I want to make plans with them, I call them.
Since I don't make too many calls, or text a lot, my friends never see me on my phone when I'm chilling with them.