The Puzzle of Facebook

Well, they’ve done it again. Facebook in their infinite wisdom has decided they can now read my mind (well they always thought they could) and they’ve rolled out a ton of new (unwanted) changes. This latest round of changes has me a slight bit upset, I am missing so many posts that I WANT to see and seeing crap that I could careless about, I’m guessing that FB only THINKS they are GODLIKE! This recent round has me seriously considering a permanent switch to Google + or just moving over to Twitter completely and saying “F&%” FB. However,

Since I am terrified of the cost of rehab and the withdrawal symptons I will probably continue to stay…

Here is my two cents on the most recent changes that I’ve seen (both good and bad, because they are not ALL bad, some are just plain annoying as hell but that doesn’t count).

	LISTS- at first I thought UGH! but now that I’ve had a chance to play with them I actually LIKE them. Lists have been around forever, BUT they weren’t really user-friendly. I tried using them in the past but they just didn’t work well. Now, FB has made it very simple to add people to your lists and when you click on the list name thats all you see AND in chronological order, with no scrolling ticker (as of yet)- THIS I REALLY LIKE. So overall I like this feature.
	TICKER – hmmm this one I really don’t LIKE, however, I can see it’s usefulness if you are on FB ALL the TIME like I am, it is certainly convienent to see (in order) who is doing what and where and when, but it is giving me a large HEADACHE cause it moves relatively quickly (at least on my pages with 470 friends). If you are on FB all the time, then this is a useful tool because with the new wall not being in order you may miss something (you WILL miss ALOT) so as long as you LIVE on FB and can keep up with everything as it happens this feature is awesome you can just follow the ticker and comment on FB within FB. However the downside, if you are only FB a few minutes here and there this may not be nearly as useful. – For me, this is a DISLIKE!
	WALL/NEWSFEED – this one I have BIG problems with. This is where FB assumes (and you know what they say about those who ASS U + ME) that they are the ALL KNOWING and so far this is just NOT proving true. (even on my phone) if I want to quickly check FB I don’t want to scroll 2 miles of posts to FIND what I am looking for to see that I have (yet again) missed the latest photos of my great grandmother. They should honestly give us an OPTION to use their suggestions OR just list everything in CHRONOLOGICAL order. I would be HAPPY if I had a CHOICE here.
	PAGES – Facebook do you really want to drive all your businesses away? Because I predict if you keep this up that is exactly what you will do. As a business owner I really am glad that my business IS websites and FB pages. If not I would be royally screwed (for what the 3rd/4th time in a YEAR). From what I am reading you are going to force us ALL to have to PAY for SSL on our HTML Tabs on Facebook. Businesses are going to get really TIRED of having to REPAY for their pages to WORK.
	SUBSCRIPTIONS – So far I LIKE this, I don’t have to FRIEND everyone to follow what they are talking about – for instance bloggers, there are some that occassionally post an interesting article and for that I would like to subscribe vs have to follow when they use the toilet.. So here’s a THUMBS UP for this one. (I reserve the right to change my mind based on annoyance factors).
	PHOTOS – Ok I LIKE this one too, but my world is ART and photos.. so having larger photos display is something that I’ve wanted for a LONG time – I still liked the view screen to have the black background vs the white but that is because photos pop more on a black background – but that is just me.

Basically, my take on ALL these changes is that FB is ASSUMING (again) that most of us are technically saavy, while many are, those who aren’t are going to stop visiting FB as much, my mom for one… She will be confused for a while on this new system, she will miss ALL of our updates and posts. I can see that using ALL the new features in a COLLECTIVE sense it could make FB a great experience, but how many people out there are going to realize that using the lists in conjunction with the new newsfeed and ticker will allow them to see everything in one place? I still haven’t quite figured it out, but I’ve hit on it a bit.

Facebook, please stop changing things, people liked the way it was before. Unless you have people screaming they are going to leave (as you have NOW) don’t try to “FIX” what aint broke. at the very least don’t roll ALL the changes out at one time – give them a year or two between changes.