Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

New Facebook Update Lets You Choose News Feed Content

Posted by samzenpus on from the new-feature dept.

An anonymous reader writes The company has rolled out some changes that make it easier to control what comes in your News Feed. From the article: "The social network unveiled a new settings menu and customization options for News Feed that allows users to personalize the types of content they see. The News Feed settings menu, which appears in the Facebook apps and on the web, displays which friends appear most often in your News Feed and which friends you've chosen to unfollow. From there, you can choose to unfollow people you don't want to see anymore or re-follow (Facebook calls it "reconnecting" with) those you've previously hidden from your feed."

15 of 54 comments (clear)

  1. How about... by Goose+In+Orbit · · Score: 5, Informative

    ...just showing everything, in the order it arrives?

    1. Re:How about... by wisnoskij · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Because then you would miss marriage announcements from your friends because "I Fing Love Science" and 100 other pages you like posted a meme. For a significant number of accounts the users could not keep up if they browsed all day, they get more posts than seconds in the day, and even more people (like 99% of Facebook) get more posts than they will ever read. Just because I like Cumberpach does not mean I am interested in reading every thing his pr guy posts, and that like is not equivalent to liking my best friend.

      The only possible solution is for FB to figure out how important posts are and what they are, and based on individual browsing habits and likes promote the important stuff in your feed.

      --
      Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
    2. Re: How about... by therufus · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I hate having to go to settings, most recent, every time I load failbook on my phone. I've complained constantly but nobody cares.

      Not to mention the random refreshing that bumps me to the top of my feed when I'm reading something 40 swipes below.

      --
      You moved your mouse. Please restart Windows for changes to take effect.
    3. Re:How about... by Goose+In+Orbit · · Score: 4, Insightful

      If the ranking mechanism FB used was any good, I wouldn't have installed FB Purity to override it...

    4. Re: How about... by CaptainDork · · Score: 5, Funny

      I've complained constantly but nobody cares.

      We don't care.

      --
      It little behooves the best of us to comment on the rest of us.
    5. Re:How about... by Zanadou · · Score: 3, Informative

      Try this: http://www.fbpurity.com/

    6. Re:How about... by ZipK · · Score: 2

      Because then you would miss marriage announcements from your friends ...

      Then how about providing a Firehose tab to let you easily switch between curated and uncurated feeds?

    7. Re:How about... by hsmith · · Score: 2

      Twitter is going to start curating your feed for you as well... http://phandroid.com/2014/09/04/twitter-facebook-style-filtered-feed/

  2. How nice of them by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    They allow you to choose what you read. This must be what freedom feels like. Captcha: comply

  3. Yes but will it get rid of ... by Going_Digital · · Score: 2

    Bet it won't let you turn off crap like Games You May Like and other rubbish forced on us by facebook.

    1. Re:Yes but will it get rid of ... by CaptainDork · · Score: 4, Informative

      Actually, it does.

      In the upper right corner of one of those posts, click the down indicator and select "Hide all from ..."

      --
      It little behooves the best of us to comment on the rest of us.
  4. Silly question -- but... by Mister+Liberty · · Score: 2

    Why the flying fuck would I need another site to feed me news? To be honest, I've visited the website called Facebook
    maybe thrice, some indefinite time ago; it felt to be somewhat overhyped.

    1. Re:Silly question -- but... by joh · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Why the flying fuck would I need another site to feed me news?

      Facebook is the website to end all websites.

      People seem to use Facebook as a kind of mental chewing gum. There's always some gossip and "news" to scroll through. Sometimes you're interested in something of it. An endless on-the-go stream of gossip.

  5. Reinventing the RSS Wheel by theodp · · Score: 2

    Facebook and Twitter owe a HUGE debt of gratitude to RSS.

  6. Re:New Name Time by dgatwood · · Score: 2

    But according to Wikitionary [wiktionary.org], "Ars" meant "burn" in ancient french.

    And in Helvetica and Arial, burn = bum. It makes perfect sense, indeed. The British were just using an illegible font when they came up with their slang.

    --

    Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.