Facebook pages becoming useless

Recently I posted a new calendar and wanted to send a 'marketing update' to all my page fans about the availability of the new calendar for download. I couldn't find the 'update fans' button. I thought maybe I was looking in the wrong place. I kept searching for sometime and then googled it. Lo and behold! Facebook has canned that feature.

Facebook canned "update fans of my page" feature.

And the workaround they give is:

    >>post content on your page wall (duh! dont we know that!)
    >>consider facebook ads

#EpicFail

Facebook ads... for what? to communicate with my own customer? How stupid is that!

This is really a cheap way for driving up the revenue.

To be able to keep in touch with my customer base was one of the key reasons I have a fb page. I don't see that advantage anymore.