Facebook Users' Verdict On Redesign: Hate!
This story was written by CNET's Caroline McCarthy.
So there's a new Facebook app out there, designed to poll users on the social network's latest redesign. The results? Hundreds of thousands have responded. 94 percent give it a thumbs-down. Ouch.
Comments range from "WHY FIX IT, WHEN IT WASN'T BROKE, you will be SORRYYYYYYYYYYY" to "It feels counterintuitive and less technologically advanced than the last layout."
Now, this is clearly not an official vote. Chances are, you're not going to install a third-party polling application with the sole purpose of voicing an opinion on the new Facebook design unless you're really opinionated about it. So the 94 percent might be kind of high.
But still. Facebook is so big now - over 175 million members - that even an interface change may throw many of the less technical users completely off-guard. And from what we've heard, non-geeks really do find the new design more difficult to use. The new site, particularly the activity feeds on member profiles, really do look different. The blurring between status messages and wall posts doesn't make much sense in my opinion - though I do like the improved news feed filtering tools.
It's easy to wave this off, because Facebook redesigns have brought up one threatened user revolt after another, and the site has just kept on growing. Members grew used to the new features, and in some cases (like the original launch of the news feed) it's hard to imagine Facebook without them. The only changes Facebook has made in response to user outrage, historically, have been in response to privacy concerns.
But Facebook's not just dealing with the young and tech-savvy anymore. When the people who freak out over a redesigned phone bill or cable channel-changing menu have Facebook profiles, "they'll get used to it" doesn't float as well. So this could really be a problem.
The new layout is a forward-thinking one, inspired by streaming content services like Twitter. Executives from Facebook have said that they see "the stream" as the next evolution of how we interact on the Web.
But even though Twitter's all over daytime talk shows these days, it's still just barely out of the gates as something more than an early-adopter toy. It's a fraction the size of Facebook. And the "Twitter plus media sharing" model doesn't have the best track record, as its most notable example, Pownce, was sold to Six Apart and shut down amid dwindling traffic. It probably would've been smarter for Facebook to ease users into the "stream" with a course of smaller tweaks rather than to require them to plunge in headlong.
Facebook's last redesign was finalized in September. That's only six months ago. If a site is putting out changes every six months that a mainstream audience sees as drastic, they could get fed up with it fast.
By Caroline McCarthy
CNET So there's a new Facebook app out there, designed to poll users on the social network's latest redesign. The results? Hundreds of thousands have responded. 94 percent give it a thumbs-down. Ouch.
Comments range from "WHY FIX IT, WHEN IT WASN'T BROKE, you will be SORRYYYYYYYYYYY" to "It feels counterintuitive and less technologically advanced than the last layout."
Now, this is clearly not an official vote. Chances are, you're not going to install a third-party polling application with the sole purpose of voicing an opinion on the new Facebook design unless you're really opinionated about it. So the 94 percent might be kind of high.
But still. Facebook is so big now - over 175 million members - that even an interface change may throw many of the less technical users completely off-guard. And from what we've heard, non-geeks really do find the new design more difficult to use. The new site, particularly the activity feeds on member profiles, really do look different. The blurring between status messages and wall posts doesn't make much sense in my opinion - though I do like the improved news feed filtering tools.
It's easy to wave this off, because Facebook redesigns have brought up one threatened user revolt after another, and the site has just kept on growing. Members grew used to the new features, and in some cases (like the original launch of the news feed) it's hard to imagine Facebook without them. The only changes Facebook has made in response to user outrage, historically, have been in response to privacy concerns.
But Facebook's not just dealing with the young and tech-savvy anymore. When the people who freak out over a redesigned phone bill or cable channel-changing menu have Facebook profiles, "they'll get used to it" doesn't float as well. So this could really be a problem.
The new layout is a forward-thinking one, inspired by streaming content services like Twitter. Executives from Facebook have said that they see "the stream" as the next evolution of how we interact on the Web.
But even though Twitter's all over daytime talk shows these days, it's still just barely out of the gates as something more than an early-adopter toy. It's a fraction the size of Facebook. And the "Twitter plus media sharing" model doesn't have the best track record, as its most notable example, Pownce, was sold to Six Apart and shut down amid dwindling traffic. It probably would've been smarter for Facebook to ease users into the "stream" with a course of smaller tweaks rather than to require them to plunge in headlong.
Facebook's last redesign was finalized in September. That's only six months ago. If a site is putting out changes every six months that a mainstream audience sees as drastic, they could get fed up with it fast.
By Caroline McCarthy
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The oldest users of the site have so much information and history on it (and that's what - around four to five years worth of online interactions?) that they might indeed be quite loathe to delete their account. Although it is completely possible and perfectly easy to return to the Dark Side, as Facebook saves all your info in case you do want to return.
With more and more sites and tools to choose from however, it is still possible to
-upload content and share it with friends (remember that good old thing called email?)
-update your status (Twitter, Jaiku, Plurk...)
-share photos (flickr, Picasa, and such)
-create notes (blogs of all flavours)
-join groups (look for newsgroups instead of Facebook groups - try groups.google.com )
-share videos (dailymotion, YouTube, Vimeo... keep looking)
-and all and alll...
I've got all my profiles listed in my email signature (abbreviated when necessary with tinrul.com's cutsom link feature). I'm working on creating my own web page - a single page - with the relevant links and possibly with RSS items pulling from the various sources listed above.
So my new social network will be... well Web 2.0 pre-Facebook and their shadowers.
Since then I have told my friends if they want to contact me they should email or phone or actually meet me and REAL life has been so much more rewarding.
In addition to this I have set up <a href="http://myrealwall.blogspot.com">www.myrealwall.com</a> where people can still post on my wall, but with a twist.
Instead of posting on my facebook wall, if people want to post on my wall now, they actually have to write me a REAL post i.e. a letter and put a stamp on it and send it to my house. I then take their post, read it and stick it on my REAL wall, which then gets photographed every day and posted on the net.
This little social experiment has proved to be quite a neat little filter and I've noticed that the spam I receive from friends has effectively been cut to zero and I have not been bitten by a zombie since I started, although I've had a couple of pokes from friends, who have actually made the effort to come to my house and poke me in REAL life.
It hurts.
It's a strange old place facebook. People will whinge about how much they hate it, the new design etc. But when it comes down to let's see how many facebookers do more than complain and put their money where their mouth is and actually LEAVE facebook as a result.
Not many I suspect.
<a href="http://andytgeezer.blogspot.com">mischief</a>
http://blog.openmountain.com/2009/03/23/facebook-needs-feedback-loops/
Firefox browser users can get rid of the highlights section!
We're just trying to be honest (and open) in our recently posted (somewhat positive) opinion
about the newly updated FaceBook (FB) design (we're FB newbies and didn't have an easy go of it with the older FB design for some reason) - please understand that we have no fascination (or investment) whatsoever with FaceBook - perhaps even less so with MySpace - actually, we prefer LiveJournal instead at the moment. In any case, we hope these present comments help in some ok way. :)
Dr. Dennis and Joanne Bogdan