Comments on: Facebook Relents: Users Get More Control With Redesign Tweaks

By: Headlines for March 25th, 2009 | Modern Media Mom

Headlines for March 25th, 2009 | Modern Media Mom — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 22:58:39 +0000

[...] Facebook Relents: Users Get More Control With Redesign Tweaks – I was in the minority – I liked the changes. [...]

By: French Fury: Parisians Hit The Streets In Protest Against Facebook Redesign

French Fury: Parisians Hit The Streets In Protest Against Facebook Redesign — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 02:02:32 +0000

[...] they’re not happy with the redesign even if Facebook has already made some changes due to user complaints (against Michael’s advice), or maybe they’re just really pissed [...]

By: French Fury: Parisians Hit The Streets In Protest Against Facebook Redesign | CHARGED's Digital Lifestyle at Work or Play

Sun, 19 Apr 2009 20:15:36 +0000

[...] they’re not happy with the redesign even if Facebook has already made some changes due to user complaints (against Michael’s advice), or maybe they’re just really pissed [...]

By: Reflections of a BizDrivenLife » Blog Archive » No! Never Surrender To Your Users, Facebook.

Mon, 13 Apr 2009 08:02:23 +0000

[...] I’m surprised that Facebook, which has stared down its users so many times in the past, is folding on the most recent redesign flareup and reverting back to some old features. Just because, oh, a [...]

By: The New Facebook | College Jolt

The New Facebook | College Jolt — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 15:26:24 +0000

[...] main problem with the new Facebook is, essentially, that it’s different. People are innately averted to [...]

By: Bluewire Media Web Design Blog » Blog Archive » Weekly round-up

Bluewire Media Web Design Blog » Blog Archive » Weekly round-up — Sat, 28 Mar 2009 01:17:31 +0000

[...] Facebook Relents: Users get more control with redesign tweaks — TechCrunch [...]

By: mattmcb

mattmcb — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 19:38:31 +0000

The Facebook homepage is very cool, but the best homepage I’ve seen so far is sthrt.com and I would recommend checking it out.

By: Rob Bono

Fri, 27 Mar 2009 09:04:40 +0000

Facebook should give massages when I log in. I’m going to start a Facebook group to demand this. Also they should really give free beer. WTF is Facebook’s problem? Stingy.

By: Gilbert

Gilbert — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 02:14:46 +0000

I hate the new design. They should have a beta link first and conduct a survey on their new design

By: The People v. Facebook « Andi Narvaez - Down and Across

The People v. Facebook « Andi Narvaez - Down and Across — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 00:56:26 +0000

[...] reality is that even if TechCrunch does write, not one but two posts, about Facebook redesigning the new home page in response to the millions who complained about it, the little give that Facebook [...]

By: Shahab Khan

Shahab Khan — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 15:57:50 +0000

Facebook redesign is all messed up, they should try to switch back to the previous version.

By: fb2250783

Thu, 26 Mar 2009 01:44:55 +0000

Actually, Facebook HAD an auto-updating view — the old “live feed” tab on the homepage would update itself without the user needing to refresh the homepage. So this might be an instance where Facebook has the feature ready to roll because they’ve done it before. (I used to leave it open in a spare Firefox tab and let it run while I was working.)

Which highlights the most confusing and annoying part of the Facebook revamp: Users aren’t just upset about layout changes, they’re upset about features they used actually disappearing. Why Zuckerberg thought a less-featured site would be more popular is something of a mystery.

By: The Far Edge » Blog Archive » No! Never Surrender To Your Users, Facebook.

Thu, 26 Mar 2009 00:01:16 +0000

By: Ken Duncan

Ken Duncan — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 21:32:48 +0000

Kia Ora, to those that say only 1% have complained about the new facebook then they are not taking into account standard take on a complaint. For every complaint you get there used to be said six who didn’t, they just went somewhere else. So that would suddenly make it 7%, but now in the age of the internet they are saying one person complaining can now go to 200 people. Now if that happened there wouldn’t be a face book. I have around 150 friends so far on face book. they know from my posts I am not happy with it. Others are now saying same. One person even posted ‘how come there are so many upset with Face book?” Most of those have not joined a group. so issue is much bigger than just 1%.

By: Yoeun Pen

Wed, 25 Mar 2009 21:26:11 +0000

I think the main problem most people have with the redesign is that it took away a lot of the functionality of the previous Facebook homepage–namely feed customisation. It all got dropped to make FB a Twitter clone. My friends and I definitely use FB less after the redesign. The site, as a whole, became less useful.

Before: You can remove feeds from friends or individual apps
After: You can only remove a friend from the feed

Before: You can decide what apps show up in your homepage
After: There is no way to remove/add apps in the left column

Before: Upcoming events are highlighted
After: Only events for *today* are shown

Before: Homepage shows your current status at the top
After: Your status is mixed in with the other feeds

They’re ‘adding’ picture tagging in the feed? That was in the old feeds/homepage. They’re selling it like it’s a new feature. Event and friend invite notifications are also less prominent. This is a problem because FB has replaced Evites for me and my friends. There’s also no rhyme or reason to what shows up in the Highlights. Is it a news feed for non-status updates, or is it a place to spam ads/apps?

However, one thing they got right in the new homepage, IMO, is filtering your feed by friend lists.

By: No! Never Surrender To Your Users, Facebook. | Programming Blog

No! Never Surrender To Your Users, Facebook. | Programming Blog — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 20:39:43 +0000

By: Tuna

Tuna — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 20:15:01 +0000

Even if they changed a single pixel, I accept it as an apology and an admittance of their fault. Facebook has earned my respect with this move

By: Kevin

Kevin — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 19:58:33 +0000

Doug, I 100% agree with your points, in particular: “To me it seems the real caving on Facebook’s part is to submit to the fear of needing to be like Twitter, rather than sticking with its individuality.” You hit the nail on the head.

FB better listen to their users or they will fail to another player that does. It’s just a matter of which users they listen to. IMO, if FB becomes more like Twitter, it opens the door for new or existing players to snatch up users who aren’t enamored with Twitter (and there are plenty). Keep an eye on that FB growth curve!

Change will and must happen, yes. But, at the same time, don’t knock consistency and it’s power to influence user behavior. Google is the perfect example of that strength. Sometimes the “change” everyone talks about so much can be a migration to a different service.

By: brian rose

brian rose — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 18:35:01 +0000

But I thought Mark said companies who listen to its users are stupid?

By: Harrisburg Web Design

Harrisburg Web Design — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 18:26:18 +0000

It’s not the new design aspects that are the problem, it’s the lack of control on what you see in your feed that is the major issue. If we don’t want to see quizzes from everybody for example but still want to see everything else from that person we should be able to turn the quizzes only off.

By: Pip

Pip — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 18:22:35 +0000

I’m sorry, but it really should.

By: Manos Matsakis

Wed, 25 Mar 2009 17:34:47 +0000

Photo tagging (and all other things mentioned) are a nice step but we still need more info that were available before: New friendships (the best way to find new friends joining), photo comments (it is also important to see all comments in the stream), group & Page joining, event participation, application installs. The Highlights section is OK but it is also important to have the above in the stream. Especially new friendships and photo comments!

By: ChinookindsCasinoOregon

ChinookindsCasinoOregon — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 16:19:04 +0000

at last a great idea for us!!!

By: lisa

lisa — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 15:36:19 +0000

“Adding back in the Photos Tagged aspect made me scratch my head even more as to why they would think ppl wouldn’t want this kind of info.”

I can’t imagine how adding “more” clutter to the news feed would be an “improvement.” Particularly when photos are currently displaying in such a cocked-up manner.

Anecdotaly, a friend edited 17 photos that she had posted months ago. EACH PHOTO re-published to the newsfeed, in batches of three large thumbnails.

Each post was over an inch deep. Additionally three people had commented on the album. With each three-picture post, the three comments also published. My *entire* news feed was taken up by this friend’s 6-month old photos…. How is this useful?

By: lisa

lisa — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 15:27:08 +0000

If you filter out the noise of “WAH, I DON’T LIKE IT, GO BACK!” — which are the people you suggest “lead the businesses they’re complaining to astray” — there are valid complaints/suggestions on ways to IMPROVE the steps Facebook has taken to “move forward.” And there are simply some things about the old interface that worked well and were inexplicably removed.

Breaking new ground is fine and well, but when did usability testing/feedback go out of vogue?