Do You Like Facebook's New Look?
The new update puts a single news feed down the middle of your profile, through which you'll see status updates from your friends that are now based on a "What are you thinking?" questions versus "What are you doing right now?" ("I'm thinking about brushing my teeth!" instead of "I'm brushing my teeth!"). The feed also includes new photos being posted, confirmation of friends adding other friends, and all the usual junk that typically floated around in various sections of the page.
Now it's all in one place, but some of the dissatisfied users think the new design makes it harder to keep an eye on what's happening as there is now a greater flood of news going through a single channel, which quickly pushes older news off the bottom of the page.
If the goal was to be more Twitter-like, the update seems to have succeeded, as we've noticed a distinct change in the types of status updates showing up in that middle feed -- people really are offering up more tweet-like random thoughts than before, along with Web addresses. What's missing, though, is some of the structure and organization that distinguished Facebook from the more streamlined Twitter and the much messier MySpace.
Reviews have been generally mixed, with a discussion poll garnering nearly 375,000 comments from users -- many of whom just don't seem to like any kind of change. While Facebook did revert its Terms of Service after user outrage, we're not thinking the company will be quite so quick to pull this latest update. [From: SFGate]
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If the goal was to be more Twitter-like, the update seems to have succeeded, as we've noticed a distinct change in the types of status updates showing up in that middle feed -- people really are offering up more tweet-like random thoughts than before, along with Web addresses. What's missing, though, is some of the structure and organization that distinguished Facebook from the more streamlined Twitter and the much messier MySpace.
Reviews have been generally mixed, with a discussion poll garnering nearly 375,000 comments from users -- many of whom just don't seem to like any kind of change. While Facebook did revert its Terms of Service after user outrage, we're not thinking the company will be quite so quick to pull this latest update. [From: SFGate]
Related Links:
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
pickleman77 said 10:52AM on 3-19-2009
If we wanted Twitter, we would be using Twitter. What I like(d) about Facebook was that everything that fell into different categories of news was easily separated in the feed. You had 3 status messages on top, and everything else that may be deemed interesting below it. Everyone I've talked to hates this new layout, and I just don't see the appeal Facebook sees in it. I felt like the update to the "new" Facebook a couple months back was a great addition, but this redesign makes me wonder how much longer I'll be able to use Facebook before it becomes something completely different.
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Joshua Fruhlinger said 10:59AM on 3-19-2009
I don't like it either. And "What's on your mind?" What is that, a therapy session?
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takamaru said 11:32AM on 3-19-2009
I hated it, but now it's growing on me.
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Nuggstein said 11:53AM on 3-19-2009
I hate it. I can't even figure out who says what anymore.
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Robbie said 1:27PM on 3-19-2009
I hated it the moment it came out, and using it for a week hasn't made me hate it any less. I hate having to click "older posts" at the bottom to see status updates from my friends who don't use Facebook as much as other friends. Just yesterday, my entire home page was taken up by a friend who insisted on sending french toast from some app to every single one of her friends. It was the only thing on my home page, like I cared about it at all!!! It really irritated me, and Facebook, which I used to adore and sign on to all the time, is starting to become like MySpace...childish and annoying.
There is no need to reinvent yourself every month, Facebook.
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beachgirl1 said 2:11PM on 3-19-2009
I agree with you. I also hate seeing all those easter eggs on every post that comes to my page.
Jeff said 4:15PM on 3-19-2009
I like the new design because it focuses on status updates which is my primary reason for using facebook. It's great to see up news feed posts in order of occurrence.
One thing I would like to see is an auto-refresh so that I don't have to refresh the page myself every couple minutes.
Most of the complaints that I've read are just because people don't understand how to work the new interface. There is a tutorial that you can read--it might help out.
If you want to see status messages from all of your friends and nothing else, click on friends from the menu at the very top of the page. The default list will be recently updated status messages.
If you have a couple friends that insist on filling up your newsfeed with stupid application crap, click the X to hide posts from that friend and it will clean up your newsfeed. That's what I did and it worked awesome. I only see the stuff that I want to see.
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Darrin said 4:57PM on 3-19-2009
I've been on facebook 4 so long, and their old look was great. Before the new one, there was another change, but small, but it was still the old one. Now with the new facebook, it's absolute crap! I wasn't able to find out if I had new friend requests or suggestions. Facebook used to be my favorite site to be on, but now that the new look took over, it makes me not want to get on it anymore. There's better website than facebook
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Darrin Johnson said 5:04PM on 3-19-2009
I've been a member of Facebook for some time, and when I first used facebook, the old facebook was less confusing. They changed it a little bit before this new look, and it still was less coufusing. Now with the dumb idea of making a new look, it confusing! I didn't know I had friend requests and friend suggestions until I looked around. It's terrible! I want my old facebook back!
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Suzanne said 11:33PM on 3-21-2009
I like the new FB probably only b/c I don't remember what the old one looked like. I had canceled my account for a few months so when I returned I didn't really notice that anything had changed. I hadn't really used FB that much in the first place. I guess it appeals to me b/c I love Twitter. The only difference between Twitter and FB for me is that my friends don't use Twitter. So when I want to see what my friends are doing (or thinking) I go to FB. When I want to see what the world is doing, I go to Twitter.
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Ryan said 12:44PM on 3-24-2009
People complain when they have to learn something new. They are becoming the old codger type people that they complained about when they were younger. Shut up people and adapt. New is good. Otherwise we'd all be in Model Ts and using dial up.
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Cocoe said 8:26PM on 3-25-2009
The old News Feed selected certain items to show you but did people never use the old "live feed"?..Live Feed essentially did what the new facebook is doing now but a lot better. Live feed was also 'real time', whereas I've found the new facebook is not. I want to know who my friends have become friends with, as it may be somebody I know. I want to know which events my friends are attending, without having to click the event icon and then have to scroll through every single event day by day. I want to know which groups my friends have joined, without having to click the groups icon and scrolling through every single thing. Whilst status updates are interesting, I dont want my home page to be purely status updates. I want to be able to delete a particular post without deleting everything from that particular person. And don't even get me started on the highlights section...Highlights is basically what the old News Feed was...random info that hung around for days without updating. New facebook is not very user friendly at all.
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Sharon said 2:53AM on 3-26-2009
"The feed also includes ... confirmation of friends adding other friends"
- no it doesn't. This is no longer part of the feed and its disappearance is one of the complaints made by users that has not been addressed in Christopher Cox's response.
Another problem not yet acknowledged by Facebook is the inability of the user to remove disturbing/unpleasant/offensive or just irrelevant content from their homepage's right-hand image bar.
Cox's response indicates some progress on allowing users to customise their homepage, but more will be needed.
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Sharon said 7:05AM on 3-26-2009
One other thought - this time on Facebook's product testing.
They could avoid some of this conflict with users by adopting multi-stage testing and rollout of product changes including:
1. A "playground" area on the site to gauge intial reactions.
2. Opt-in Beta.
3. Opt-out Beta.
This will allow those with the strongest personal stake in the user interface (probably those who have been most vociferous in their feedback to the site and participated in the new layout user poll application) to self-select and participate in product development and testing.
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stephaniemitchellc said 9:16PM on 9-13-2009
I don't know for sure if it is a good one. I hope this face book is no trouble because the last face book I had was a totally a disaster for me. There was no box to send my messages in the inbox what is going on.
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