When the social web came out, I wasn't completely enamored with it as well. It was only later, when I started getting into "network science"[1], and began to view social systems and the internet as large complex systems, that the social web really clicked as something fascinating to get involved with from an engineering perspective.

Since, as you say, you're not a "particularly social person", maybe if you step back from many of the inanities of the social web and take a big picture view of the system, including the similarities between social systems, biological systems, and other systems, you may gain a new perspective on it.

[1] See http://www.amazon.com/Networks-Introduction-Mark-Newman/dp/0... for a good introduction.