Unless you live at the bottom of the ocean, you’ve probably heard the news that Facebook is once again updating its site. As you might imagine, people are already frustrated about the change, especially Chicago-based website, Timelines.com.
According to an article on news.cnet.com, the website filed a complaint in a U.S. District Court because it believes Facebook’s new Timeline feature will demolish itswhole service. The court ruled that the feature shouldn’t be subject to a temporary restrain. Facebook did agree, however, to hold the launch for now and provide updates on how many people sign up for the service daily.
While most people aren’t going to legal extremes, grumbles about changes are inevitable. However, changes and updates to any sort of social media platform are also inevitable, so I say just go with the flow. Accept the new or quit using the site.
That said, I think you’ll embrace these changes though. Here are five changes and why they rock:
1. Cover Photo: One Timeline feature is the option of adding a cover photo. It’s sort of like a banner on a blog. Do you ever find yourself in a quandary trying to decide between the picture of you at the beach where you look so tan and toned and the picture of you and your newest boyfriend for your profile picture? Problem solved. This feature is neat because it allows you to further express yourself right away when people visit your personal profile page. You can keep your profile picture as one of you and your best friend and then add a creative cover photo or even another one of you and all of your friends.
2. The Timeline: On the right side of each profile page with the Timeline feature, there is now an actual timeline. The Timeline goes from 2011 all the way down to when you were born. The coolest thing about the timeline is that you can feature particular stories. Do you have a picture of you and your significant other on your first anniversary? How about a picture of your new baby boy or the day you graduated? Sometimes the biggest life events get hidden in the midst of daily updates about the weather, food and how boring your classes are. By featuring stories on the Timeline, they hold prominence over other stories. It helps you present yourself in the brightest light. Likewise, if you hate an old status or story that you posted, you can just delete it off the Timeline directly from your wall or from your activity log.
3. Yearly Summaries: In the timeline, there are blocks with summaries for each year. For instance, it might show that you’ve made 100 new friends in 2011, RSVP’d to 53 events and have been tagged in this many pictures with a particular person. It’s a neat feature because it’s a snap shot of the year if you want to remember your year quickly.
4. Partnerships: There are many applications on Facebook, but one that is standing out is the music application Spotify. At F8, the annual developers conference, Mark Zuckerberg, CEO and founder of Facebook, spoke highly of the sharing music. “Being able to click on someone’s music and play it is a great experience but knowing that you helped a friend discover something new and that they like your taste in music and that you now have that in common is awesome,” he said.
5. The New Look: Everything now has a new look, from the changes already mentioned to each person’s “about” page to the way certain posts look. For example, if you have an album with photos of your current school year and you add 56 new photos to it, the post will show nine medium-size thumbnails of various pictures that were added. Again, it’s a nice little snapshot of something going on in your world that you deem worthy of sharing.
Whether you like the new changes or not, they’re coming. Pinpointing the exact launch date of Timeline for everyone has been tricky, but if you can’t wait for the day it changes, there are plenty of places to go and find directions on how to update your profile to the Timeline right now. Just Google it, follow the instructions and enjoy your beautiful new profile.
Reach the reporter at mmattox@asu.edu Click here to subscribe to the daily State Press newsletter.
