facebook layout

[MikeVic]

Does anyone know how to change the new layout to go back to the old one?

[JonInMiddleGA]

Can't as far as I know, another of their "improvements".

I've been lucky so far, they're apparently rolling this out in phases & mine still hasn't changed.

[MJ4H]

Um, isn't the new one like 500x better than the last one (hint: yes)

[MikeVic]

dammit, I just wanna log in, check my stuff, and log out. There has to be a way to not show as many things in the news feed though...?

[MJ4H]

What do you want to see? You can click Friends and then Status Updates on the left tab if that's all you want to see, for instance.

[MikeVic]

I mean when I click Home... there's that News Feed on the main page. I know with the old layout, I could drag some menu item on the left to the top and all I'd see were basically status updates and some other minor stuff. Right now I'm seeing a friend commenting on a non-friend picture, status, and other crap I don't care about at all.

[KWhit]

If you don't want to see the feed(s), what exactly are you using FB for? Isn't that "crap" kind of the point of FB?

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by MikeVic

dammit, I just wanna log in, check my stuff, and log out. There has to be a way to not show as many things in the news feed though...?

That sounds like it should be easy enough based on what I've read about the new settings, their purpose seems to be to make it difficult to get hardly anything to show up best I can figure. You should look around in the settings, there should be something that allows you to not only turn off/on various types of things but also you can add/subtract people who show up in your updated feeds (along with whatever algorithm they use to pick them now).

[cuervo72]

I'm finding the rework annoying.

Sometimes I go between Top News and Most Recent in News Feed, and one or the other will say that there are no updates. Ordering within either one often seems random, where posts from days ago will show up higher than posts from 5 minutes ago. This may be because someone decided to like the older post - but honestly, I don't care if someone I don't know "liked" someone's post w/o commenting.

Friends. I would like to sometimes just get a list of my friends, so I can click on their names to see their wall. How do I get to this now? Clicking once on 'Friends' expands the navigation. Status updates just shows those who have recently had status updates. Same for clicking on any of the categories I set. What of those who haven't had recent updates? I have to go first to MY profile, then to my list of friends. PITA.

Clicking 'Friends Online' opens up the same old chat window, way on the other side of the broswer? Stupid. Have one or the other.

[Comey]

Originally Posted by MikeVic

dammit, I just wanna log in, check my stuff, and log out. There has to be a way to not show as many things in the news feed though...?

Click on what you don't want to see and there should be a option to hide those feeds. It's nice, actually. I abhor Farmville and that I got 348039849032184903 Farmville updates a day, despite the fact that I abhor Farmville. I clicked on one of them, and hid Farmville from my updates.

Poof! No more Farmville.

I use this rather liberally, because I have a fair amount of women on my friends' list that like to send out stupid little "presents" to everyone. Good Lord, that annoys me. Here's a kiss to you! Awww, snuggie bear has arrived! You're my Valentine!

Shut the hell up, please.

I like Facebook, and I know this stuff has been around since the beginning. But it's getting to be more the rule than the exception, it seems. Or maybe I'm noticing it a bit more. But it seems, oh, I don't know...too MySpace-ish (just those stupid little spam things...I like FB otherwise, still clean and more professional-looking than the total spamfest MySpace became).

[MikeVic]

Alright I'll look around the settings... I'm finding how to hide certain people, which is the same as before, but not things like "friend comments on a non-friend item" yet.

KWhit -- I like the News Feed for all friend-related activity. Not when a friend becomes a fan of something, or comments on a non-friend status, etc. I don't give a rat's ass what my friends are saying to people I don't know.

[Rizon]

The feeds have been broken for a long, long time.

I haven't noticed my page changing any, but my GFs has changed. My god is it an unorganized mess.

I hope Facebook isn't paying any employees or contractors to make these "upgrades/updates" because they're awful ... and buggy as hell.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by cuervo72

Sometimes I go between Top News and Most Recent in News Feed, and one or the other will say that there are no updates.

I've been getting that same deal since that started rolling out the new dashboard. No rhyme or reason I can find, seems to be as random as their phased roll out.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by Comey

I like Facebook, and I know this stuff has been around since the beginning. But it's getting to be more the rule than the exception, it seems.

Best I can figure, the game apps (Farmville the most prominent of them) are providing a big chunk of FB's traffic. Latest stats show that fully 1/4th of all FB users are also Farmville residents, almost half of my friends list have it activated, roughly a 1/3rd currently play it (and roughly 2/3rds play one or more games).

One of the big changes in the pipeline is a plan to virtually kill off the notifications, which I suspect may ultimately be the undoing of FB since without the gaming apps there's simply no reason for people to visit the site throughout the day. And without the notifications the already difficult time management for the games will become unmanageable for most people, leading to the death of the games. That means less traffic, which means less ad impressions, for a site that's already struggling badly to monetize their traffic. Unless the plan is to create an artificial inventory shortage to try to increase the CPM (which won't work unless they completely revamp their Godawful selling model) I don't see how reducing impressions helps them get any closer to finally getting out of the red.

[DaddyTorgo]

what would possibly motivate them to do away with the notifications then??

[Schmidty]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

Can't as far as I know, another of their "improvements".

I've been lucky so far, they're apparently rolling this out in phases & mine still hasn't changed.

You have a FB, and we aren't friends? I am publicly whining.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by DaddyTorgo

what would possibly motivate them to do away with the notifications then??

The advert guy in me has been scratching his head over that for about a month now, ever since a few of the app developers started making cryptic (and then less cryptic) comments about the changes that they'd been notified to start preparing for.

The reasoning that makes more sense to me than anything else was what I mentioned earlier, that they're actually trying to drive down impressions in order to make their existing inventory more valuable (via scarcity). It happens with both radio & TV, I suppose it could be tried online as well. I just don't see anything else that makes much sense, unless they're having capacity issues and want to solve those by driving away some of their business.

Another possibility is that they're trying to find some solution to the somewhat polarizing nature of the game apps. Look no further than this thread for an example of the wide gulf in reactions they generate. My take is that they serve an extremely valuable purpose, promoting interaction among users and even more importantly making FB an all-day destination rather than a once in a while (i.e. every few days) stop on user's internet tour.

Unless they've improved on the original plan (and that's a distinct possibility from what I've seen in the past few days) it seemed very likely to me that they were going to pretty much kill the games by killing notifications as they're at the core of nearly all of them (because of the I scratch your back & you scratch mine nature that nearly all of them feature). Without 'em there's not a trigger for that to take place. And without 'em I can't imagine I'd visit the site more than maybe once or twice a week when I happened to think about it instead of having it open at virtually all times when I'm online.

Ultimately though the move may come down to something else that I've seen mentioned in a couple of articles about the latest changes this week. Both of those basically pointed out the rather obstinate nature of FB changes during its history, a pretty clear "we don't give a damn if you like it or not" attitude that emerges every time they make a big change. I suspect the truth about this lies around some form of the Peter Principle, in that the site has grown to the point of being larger than anyone involved with it ever really imagined or is truly capable of managing very well. My own best guess is that we're right around the peak for FB and fairly soon we'll see it begin the slide back down the hill just like MySpace did before it.

[TLK]

Originally Posted by DaddyTorgo

what would possibly motivate them to do away with the notifications then??

Aren't the notifications at the top of the page?

[wade moore]

Originally Posted by MJ4H

Um, isn't the new one like 500x better than the last one (hint: yes)

BUZZ! Wrong answer!

[Logan]

I actually like the new look more than the old one, which I've hated for the last several versions (really since they made the feed the most prominent piece of the site). I still don't understand the difference between "news feed" and "live feed" or whatever the hell it was called.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by TLK

Aren't the notifications at the top of the page?

Beats me. I've only seen a few screenshots of the new layout. I still haven't been afflicted with it yet, only the bugs associated with it. The new layout also doesn't seem to be the full rollout of the app related changes that are being implement.

Supposedly the plan is for a "dashboard" styled implementation when the changes for notifications are fully in place, located in the far left frame. Problem is that it's designed (based on what's leaked so far) to show only 3 recent app related activities whereas I currently see something on the order of a dozen to two dozen per hour. Given the increasingly poor load times for nearly all of the apps checking each of the ones I'm active with individually just to see if there's something that needs attention isn't remotely realistic.

[JPhillips]

Being flooded with game updates, group join notifications and friend updates has made FB damn near useless for me. I can't actually sort through status updates because my page is flooded with so much crap. I can no longer find any way to hide types of notifications without blocking everything from an individual.

Well, FB was fun while it lasted.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by Logan

I still don't understand the difference between "news feed" and "live feed" or whatever the hell it was called.

That was pretty easy to explain. News feed was culled from all your friends activity in the past 24-72 hours, with priority given to certain people's items based on some secret formula that only FB knew the specifics of but weighted to some extent to those you interacted with most frequently. Live feed was largely unfiltered near real-time on whatever level of info you chose (only friends vs friends + friends of friends, etc)

[Passacaglia]

So wait...those games notify you and tell you when to do stuff? I thought they were something more like Trukz, where you log on once a day to check stuff out.

the rather obstinate nature of FB changes during its history, a pretty clear "we don't give a damn if you like it or not" attitude that emerges every time they make a big change

In all the changes I've seen FB make, it's pretty rare to see actual complaints about the changes made. With so many people using the site, the only statement that the loudest voices can agree on is "we don't like change", which makes no sense for FB to respond to when they're trying to improve their product.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by JPhillips

Being flooded with game updates, group join notifications and friend updates has made FB damn near useless for me. I can't actually sort through status updates because my page is flooded with so much crap. I can no longer find any way to hide types of notifications without blocking everything from an individual. Well, FB was fun while it lasted.

Barring bugs, there should be settings that actually give more control than before. Problem is that the implementation seems to be buggy as hell so far. Check out the various help forums & you'll see nearly every feature is broken at least for some users, maybe none of the bugs more irritating than the fact that changing your settings for things like what level of updates from your friends isn't persistent, i.e. users are having to change their preferences with every log in.

[MJ4H]

Originally Posted by wade moore

BUZZ! Wrong answer!

It certainly appears to be to me.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by Passacaglia

So wait...those games notify you and tell you when to do stuff? I thought they were something more like Trukz, where you log on once a day to check stuff out.

Not at all, at least not if you're truly engaged in the games. That plural is a big key to the amount too, depending on not only which games you play but also how many of them. On average, I get roughly a dozen game notifications an hour for all but the overnight hours, plus another half dozen or so requests for some action per hour, and that's all outside of whatever activity within the games I do for myself. So outside of the puzzle type games each individual game is similar to Trukz, where eventually you're done until some timing sequence expires, there's a significant level of activity to conduct outside of your own play. And for success in many of the games that's important stuff as various items are only available through some (automated) interaction with friends or "neighbors" as a lot of the games call them.

In all the changes I've seen FB make, it's pretty rare to see actual complaints about the changes made.

That's definitely contrary to both my limited (6 month'ish) experience as well as every account of previous changes I've read, which basically described them as having one of the more remarkable track records of increasing unhappiness with every change they've made back to day one.

[MJ4H]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

That's definitely contrary to both my limited (6 month'ish) experience as well as every account of previous changes I've read, which basically described them as having one of the more remarkable track records of increasing unhappiness with every change they've made back to day one.

In my experience, it's the one thing you can count on. When facebook changes, people bitch.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by MJ4H

In my experience, it's the one thing you can count on. When facebook changes, people bitch.

Yeah, that's pretty much my take too. And it's interesting to watch as people on my list drop their use of FB each time there's a noticeable change.

While their raw numbers are still increasing, the attrition rate has to be pretty bad.

[JonInMiddleGA]

For those who are curious, here's an interesting site that not only tracks (attempts to track?) app usage right down to daily trends but also collects various FB app related news.

For example, EA is apparently planning to launch some form of Madden on FB.
EA To Release Madden NFL Game For Facebook

[ISiddiqui]

The annoying thing for me is that I'm stuck on the old format. I want the new one, but for some reason facebook has me on the old one. Grumble.

[stevew]

Fuck all the farmville, mafia wars, roller coaster shit.

[Passacaglia]

Originally Posted by ISiddiqui

The annoying thing for me is that I'm stuck on the old format. I want the new one, but for some reason facebook has me on the old one. Grumble.

Same here. I want to check it out and see what everyone is whining about.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by stevew

Fuck all the farmville, mafia wars, roller coaster shit.

This kind of highlights something I've never really understood, namely the animosity toward the game apps.

I mean, I get that they aren't everybody's thing, that's cool. But it's also a matter of one click per app that annoys you to make them disappear from your feed forever. Don't like the joining requests? Again, one click & they vanish forever. How hard is that?

I mean, my wife is one of the least tech savvy people on the planet & she managed to conquer it with great ease, so why is it still an issue for anyone? Don't like them, then make them go away, how tough is it?

[stevew]

I'm like a 100% mobile facebook user, basically. I can't figure out how to adjust them so they go away. I think I may have made it happen, but I'm not sure.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by stevew

I'm like a 100% mobile facebook user, basically. I can't figure out how to adjust them so they go away. I think I may have made it happen, but I'm not sure.

I don't know what options you see/don't see with the mobile thing but if they're as annoying to you as they seem to be then I'd strongly suggest logging in at least once from an actual pc and fixing the majority of the problem in a matter of minutes. If you just knock out the ones you mentioned you should cut deeply into the number of them you see.

[JPhillips]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

This kind of highlights something I've never really understood, namely the animosity toward the game apps.

I mean, I get that they aren't everybody's thing, that's cool. But it's also a matter of one click per app that annoys you to make them disappear from your feed forever. Don't like the joining requests? Again, one click & they vanish forever. How hard is that?

I mean, my wife is one of the least tech savvy people on the planet & she managed to conquer it with great ease, so why is it still an issue for anyone? Don't like them, then make them go away, how tough is it?

That's the way it used to be, but I can't figure out how to do that on the new layout.

[Ronnie Dobbs2]

Hover just to the right of the post, a hide box comes up, you select Hide *Obnoxious App* and it's gone.

[KWhit]

[JPhillips]

Originally Posted by Ronnie Dobbs2

Hover just to the right of the post, a hide box comes up, you select Hide *Obnoxious App* and it's gone.

Thanks. Now if I could do the same with "X and X are friends" and "X has joined the group Y" posts.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by JPhillips

Thanks. Now if I could do the same with "X and X are friends" and "X has joined the group Y" posts.

I think you can, at least if the settings options are working the way they're supposed to (and I understand what "supposed to" is correctly).

Somewhere, I believe it's hidden amongst options found in your Friends tab now, should be something along the lines of "only status updates from this person". Or at least that's what I've read is possible.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Another of those random FB tidbits released this morning.

Basically over the last 6 months the number of users has doubled but the amount of user-posted content has quintupled ... despite a decline in the amount of typed-in status reports. Bottom line is that there's more content being shared, with a belief that the increase in ease to link items from other websites to Facebook playing the biggest part. In other words, if you think there's a lot more stuff in your feeds than there used to be, you're right. And since the average user shares 12 pieces of content (their own status or some other content) each week, the more you grow your friends list the more stuff you're going to see by close to two items more per day.

Facebook Application Statistics

[DaddyTorgo]

how much more is actual user-generated content versus games/polls (what i'll characterize as "fluff")

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by DaddyTorgo

how much more is actual user-generated content versus games/polls (what i'll characterize as "fluff")

I've now read three versions of this same basic info & honestly can't tell what the breakout of those is, or whether they're even being counted as "user generated content".

Just based on the baseline average of 12 pieces per week, I have a hard time imagining those are included in these stats at all. I generate more than 12 of those per hour each day, much less in a week.

edit to add: Here's a slightly more detailed breakdown which includes a staggering figure of 3 BILLION photo uploads per month.

[DaddyTorgo]

cool - thanks Jon.

damn - that's a lot of photos

[Ronnie Dobbs2]

I'm taking a class on the digital age and the professor pointed out that Facebook has roughly a petabyte of data (order of magnitude-wise).

[DaddyTorgo]

that's petabyte and not pedabyte right Ronnie?

[KWhit]

Originally Posted by DaddyTorgo

that's petabyte and not pedabyte right Ronnie?

My hard drive says it can be both.

I keed. I keed.

[Lathum]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

Another of those random FB tidbits released this morning.

Basically over the last 6 months the number of users has doubled but the amount of user-posted content has quintupled ... despite a decline in the amount of typed-in status reports. Bottom line is that there's more content being shared, with a belief that the increase in ease to link items from other websites to Facebook playing the biggest part. In other words, if you think there's a lot more stuff in your feeds than there used to be, you're right. And since the average user shares 12 pieces of content (their own status or some other content) each week, the more you grow your friends list the more stuff you're going to see by close to two items more per day.

Facebook Application Statistics

I think this has a lot to do with older people who have ore time on their hands joining up. My In-Laws joined about 6-8 months ago and they are constantly playing those stupid games.

[Ronnie Dobbs2]

Yeah, and I think even that number is obsolete, they're probably in the tens of petabytes now. They were at 5 in November.

Yesterday’s Terabyte is Today’s Petabyte « Previously Impossible