In the last few days we’ve gotten multiple tips about a seemingly new phenomenon on Facebook: people are receiving status updates from people they’ve attempted to add as friends, but who have not yet accepted their friend request. In effect, they’re seeing these users’ status updates without being able to see their profiles — something that hasn’t previously happened on Facebook, at least not until very recently. So has Facebook finally turned on the Twitter-like ‘follow’ feature it promised months ago, which would allow users to start receiving status updates from people they aren’t friends with?
Not exactly. As it turns out, this feature was first announced in late June, nestled in Facebook’s blog post about the beta rollout of its Publisher upgrade, which lets you choose who you’d like a given update to be visible to. Now, any time you add a Facebook friend who has set their status updates to ‘Everyone’, you’ll start receiving those updates in your News Feed, even if they never accept your friend request.
In a sense this is akin to what the ‘follow’ feature will be one day, but it’s not a particularly good substitute. For one, there isn’t an easy way to tell if someone has their status updates set to ‘everyone’, so you’re going to be taking a shot in the dark every time you add one of these people as friends. And you’ll also wind up spamming inboxes with friend requests in the process. Still, the feature, and especially our readers’ reaction to it, show just how confusing Facebook can become when it’s a mix of both one and two-way connections.
The current setup is decidedly strange. Since March, you’ve been able to set certain portions of your profile and status updates to everyone, which make them visible to anyone who arrived at your profile via Facebook search or clicked on your name after seeing it on someone else’s wall. But there still isn’t an option that allows users to ‘follow’ someone and receive their status updates in their News Feed without making the leap into becoming Facebook friends. That feature is still reserved for Pages, which allow for one-way connections. Users are free to make their own Facebook Pages, though these don’t let you have a separate group of friends that have access to more personal data, like your photos. But the distinction between Profiles and Pages is supposed to be fading, so maybe they’ll have that feature soon. It’s all very confusing.
Hopefully this will all clear up once Facebook deploys its much-anticipated new privacy features, which will bring with them more control and hopefully a more intuitive experience. However, that update will also feature a heavier emphasis on sharing with everyone — something that I think may wind up leading to even more problems.
Thanks to Jesse Waites for the tip.
Image by Shaun MItchem.
And their SMS system for status updates is severly delayed. Someone will update their status and I get it on my phone hours later.
Facebook does a lot of shady things under cover. The pile of application and updates coming from them also catches the user unaware of what is coming when. Facebook now wants to you your information, pic etc to make Facebook advertisments. They are getting nasty. Is this how MZ said he will achieve the target of #500m for 2009?
I dunno why bother with twitter when there are sites like F2: http://f2bbs.com
facebook has responded about the photos-on-ads rumors, which are apparently false: http://blog.facebook.com/
geez, an easy way to make this feature work on FB is simply to add 2 radio buttons under the status update entry field.
button 1 says: public post
button 2 says: visible only by my friends
problem solved.
the ‘followers’ who are not true friends will only get your public status updates, that you don’t mind sharing with the world, like your latest super hot opinion about the death of MJ. and your friends will be the only ones able to see your kinky pictures.
This will make for stalkers an easy job. Facebook should make a separate page to see who all “following”/stalking our public status updates and block them.
I just posted a comment and it didnt show up. So trying again:
FB’s status update SMS features are severely delayed. When you subscribe to someone via sms and they update their status you get it hours later.
That’s anti-realtime!
I’ve been getting requests from people to approve them or disapprove them because they’ve been getting status updates and have no way to unfollow. They’re caught in a kind of limbo. So it seems like this is an unintended consequence of something else, rather than an intentional feature.
I thought about that too, but can’t they just hit the ‘hide’ button on News Feed?
You need to go to the person’s page and click ‘cancel friend request’.
This has been happening for longer than you state though. I saw it with someone I added about 3 months ago.
Facebook is going to kill twitter.
I think trying to be like Twitter is going to kill Facebook. Have they noticed the drop-out rate at Twitter?
true. facebook can eliminate twitter without alienating their users
Yeah I completely agree. Facebook is getting pretty wacky and getting away from the thing it does best. I think they’re going to piss off A LOT of their users if they don’t tread lightly on this whole “be more like Twitter” thing.
Not sure if I like this feature on FB. I only want people who are friends to be able to see my status’, not everyone I send a friend invite to, or who sends me one. I don’t blindly approve all friend requests and for the people I deny, I don’t want them to be able to see what I’m up to.
There is already so much NOISE in this world with all the other social networks, etc., and the Twitter stream came along and turned the volume up to 10. The noise is so loud in fact that Twitter execs can’t think straight as to just WTF they have because the stream is out of control. Too hard to manage. Time to get the lasso out.
Seems to me that if the data stream is so freakin’ valuable for users and businesses then a simple tiered subscription model is the way to go. That would really test if Twitter is a long term asset. But Twitter needs to hurry.
Facebook could create this same stream instantly with the users they already have and call it Twitface. Of course users would have to opt in. They wouldn’t have to charge individuals a subscription because the FB platform can handle ads just fine. They could also charge brands big money to fish and chum the waters.
In the end, I think Facebook wins. Much more manageable and thought out platform.
Ev and the boys should realize this and sell Twitter now. (Or last month
Haha, yes! Twitface.
If Facebook is copying from another service, it’s FriendFeed, not Twitter. Please, stop giving Twitter credit for everything! Their follower system was actually borrowed from Digg.
Goes to show one person’s Twitter is another’s FriendFeed. When will everyone agree on universalities?
This is a FAIL for Facebook. Facebook is about real friend connections, while Twitter is more like a blog–you follow people who are interesting and others do the same to you.
I guess there is no reason not to add the follower platform to Facebook, but they put to much work into it. They have become less unique and more of a competitor. They really need to focus on doing their own thing and leaving Twitter alone.
There are so many things that Facebook could do to be succesfull and profitable. But, instead, they choose not to do any of those, and copy a company that is barely making any money. I think they are just overcome with jealousy because of Twitter’s success.
Actually, this will help people like Bill Gates, who are fleeing Facebook similarly to other public figures. Everybody will be able to follow them, but their friends will be the real friends still within a reasonable limit. Why do popular people need to maintain both a public page and a profile? – It’s too much work! Well, you can let your PR manage your page and you maintain your profile, but then it will be all fake.
That’s a very good point. The follower thing is actually looking like a good idea to me after all. I still think Facebook needs to stop trying to be like Twitter though. They have actually “removed” features to be more like Twitter. For example, the News Feed no longer (as of a few months ago) contains things like video or pictures. It’s now just Status and Wall Posts.
seems like facebook is having some twitter envy for a while now.
Are you serious? I think it’s the opposite – everybody envies Facebook for their phenomenal growth, user base, and huge moneymaking potential.
I assume facebook will twitter about this feature soon
I think this is more for protection for facebook than to compete with twitter. It is like when companies go after patents, it is more for protecting their IP , not really to go after competition.
Amazing. They keep innovating.
I like the Twitter like stream on facebook but then I have enjoyed most of the other changes they have made along the way despite the 101 facebook groups that always spring up in response.
I don’t think Twitter is popular by its function. But by its headline in the newspaper recently. Even here in Asia. Politicians are using that as the result of seeing those in the states.
1) I quit FB 2 months ago the minute my dad joined it. Now 3 of my aunts are on FB and i’m sure glad i deactivated my account. Same goes to my 4 colleagues in office.
2) 10% of followers contribute to 90% of Tweets. High bounce rate on site. I just stopped Tweeting after 2 years on it. Enough is enough.
Next site in line?
try http://askaround.me/
my advice to facebook: instead of asking people to post updates publicly, allow them to use a public profile (page) for people other than your friends, and allow users to select where they want to publish each update. it’s a lot less complicated, the mechanism is already there, and you won’t alienate users.
It’s just too much work unless you have a dedicated PR firm to manage your public page.
Wait. Didn’t Techcrunch integrate Twitter functionality first? Kudos to Techcrunch for beating Facebook to the punch.
Truth is I am working on a stealth project that will far surpass Facebook, Twitter and I guess MySpace. So wish me luck.
Anyway the really cool thing about Facebook changes is that it will make the job of the scammer easier. Because everyone puts their REAL NAME on facebook and location.
Lets see Harold Jenkins will be going to china for the weekend? he lives in NY NY right? I heard him talking about his residence.
Or let me figure out James’s passwords, he has such a big mouth and I know where he works.
Thanks facebook! oh and lets still from Grandma she lives right accross the street.
This is going to destroy facebook, I guarantee it. They should have stuck to what they were good at, private conversations with friends… stupid idiots
It’s about live search and pull advertising. The push ad model is just about due for an autopsy. If FB can kill both stones with one bird, then they’ve got $25 billion company by 2012.
No one is going to pull ads. People HATE ads.
Furthermore, the site would never be able to know what ads I need to see at the moment based on my interests, activities, etc. Right now, I’m seeking out some comfortable golf shoes, but how in the hell would Facebook ever know that based on my profile?
the privacy settings seem to be causing the complexity in adding the Twitter-like ‘follow’ function. however i appreciate the development of this function with privacy considerations, since Facebook would then have the ability to gauge the ratio of private to the more public users–and of those who are more transparent or open to ads as well. Twitter doesn’t deal with ads, so the privacy question is less an issue. but good luck Facebook!