Wednesday, December 2, 2009

Your Facebook is about to change ... again.


Facebook has been making lots of changes and not everyone is happy.

Over the next few weeks, they're doing it again.  This time you should be ready.


Late last night, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg blogged about the upcoming changes. The news traveled like lightning across the Internet.  I even re-tweeted it .... because it's significant.

In these much different (and much faster) times, in less than 10 minutes, Zuckerberg's post was No. 1 on the Technology aggregator TechMeMe and as of this writing, it still is.

If you talk to the average Facebook user (I'm not sure exactly what that is but you should be able to find one ...).  Ask them if they've read the 'Terms of Service'.

Let me make this easy.

Unless they're a journalist, they didn't.


The users I've spoken with like Facebook and/or it use it for a variety of reasons from staying in touch with family to promoting a product or idea, and yes, some just get on and play Farmville... It's an all encompassing platform.


Many have just figured out that to get the latest posts in their  'News Feed' they need to switch the view at the top.  The Friendfeed-like feed (most popular to the top) is now the default.

At least for now.

With Bret Taylor now heading the platform team, I expect that some of that is about to change but people don't like change ....... even though it may be a change for the better.

It's no secret that schools, employers and others may visit your Facebook page.  There have been a LOT of articles aimed at those who need to, or should be, concerned about that.

How many times have you let in a 'Friend' that you don't know.  The permissions are now out the window.  That person can now see you, and, there are actually companies hired to see what you're saying.


Regardless of where you have your permissions set, Facebook is about to change all that.  There were no specifics but my guess is a 'block' feature, maybe even 'delete' is among the group of changes being rolled out soon.

According to Zuckerberg, there are now 350 MILLION Facebook users worldwide.  Pretty incredible.

If you're a college professor, aspiring student, lawyer .... ugh .... brain surgeon, maybe you should think about checking out your permissions .... and your 'friends'?

.... and do it again in a few weeks.

You'll be glad you did.