Today the world’s most popular social network Facebook introduced its biggest interface change since the complete revamp in March.
Gone is the Highlights section at the top of the right column of the Home page. Facebook designers learned that users were often overlooking the most important information because it was tucked away in the corner. This also makes birthdays and events more visible in the right column.
The biggest change is there are now two alternating views in the center column of the Home page: News Feed and Live Feed. The bold title at the top indicates the current view, and you can click on the link next to the title to see the other view.
News Feed
When you first log into Facebook, you’ll see the the News Feed. The News Feed automatically picks the stories it thinks are most important to you based on how many friends have liked and commented on them and various other factors. Events that used to appear in the Highlights section are now back in the News Feed. This includes when friends are tagged in photos, make friends, become fans, join a group, and RSVP to events.
Live Feed
Once you’ve caught up on the important stories in the News Feed, you can switch to the Live Feed to see what’s happening now. The Live Feed is not filtered and shows all the posts. The cool thing is it will continue to update in real-time while you are logged in, so you get a sense of hanging out at a digital party where everybody knows your name.
Like all interface changes, the new features take a little while to get used to, but I’m already liking it better. See the Facebook blog for more information.
Article published on October 23, 2009
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October 23rd, 2009 at 8:36 pm
[…] This post was mentioned on Twitter by TechnologyLover, ComputerGeeker. ComputerGeeker said: Facebook News Feed vs. Live Feed http://bit.ly/14SRXu […]
October 25th, 2009 at 7:44 pm
The new stuff is awful and everyone knows it. Swallow the pride and change it back.
October 27th, 2009 at 12:16 am
I am not happy about this new live vs new feed. I really hope they change it back. I am ready to go back to Myspace, it is nicer anyhow with the ability to customize it.
Why fix something that wasn’t broke? Now my typing gets wiped out, and is gone all together.
October 27th, 2009 at 11:49 am
I really don’t like the “new facebook”. Did they even ask people first, after all the people using facebook are the ones that have to like it. So far pretty much every one of my friends has “changed it back” by making status comments their default. Just put it back please. This isnt just a bunch of people fearing change, the new way really does suck.
October 27th, 2009 at 8:37 pm
As a new user to Facebook, I was just getting used to the display. I also hate this “new and improved” look. It’s very confusing and not pleasing to the eye. I hope they change it back to what was working perfectly fine.
October 28th, 2009 at 12:24 am
You can hide the new annoying messages from the feeds! Switch to the Live Feed, and use the following technique:
http://weaxdesign.com/blog/2009/10/28/remove-is-attending-became-fan-joined-group-and-now-friends-messages-from-facebook/
October 28th, 2009 at 9:29 am
I like the Live Feed, and still digesting News Feed. Very positive change. It’s clear that some people simply don’t like change.
October 28th, 2009 at 12:44 pm
Awful. It’s a mess.
October 28th, 2009 at 1:43 pm
I hate it! I want the old way back.
October 28th, 2009 at 9:35 pm
I don’t like the new set up…It seems redundant. Just keep the Live Feed only. and is there a way for me to see status updates and actual postings but NOT see Farmville, Mafia wars and other games and stuff that people are playing?
October 30th, 2009 at 10:16 pm
News feeds is lame. Hope it gets dumped.
November 1st, 2009 at 1:53 pm
Like any other feature, there will be protests, groups created in opposition, and people whining (see comments above). But in true Facebook fashion, they’ll ride the criticism out for 2-3 weeks, and then everyone will shut up and just deal with it. Stop whining, people. Use it for 6 weeks, and if it’s still severely bothering you, go write it somewhere that matters.
November 1st, 2009 at 2:24 pm
Facebook is changing so rapidly and it seems to just irritate everyone. I hope Facebook decision makers are readying this and will go back to what was working.
November 1st, 2009 at 9:50 pm
totally conusing, just want to see whats goingon with my friends and i have to visit 3 different pages…waste of time…goodbye facebook
November 1st, 2009 at 10:38 pm
If it has to be explained, then it’s not implemented very well (or the concept is all wrong in the first place).
November 4th, 2009 at 10:50 am
Has anybody else noticed that the notifications tab (bottom right of screen) is now almost completely made up of spam from developers of pointless games.
November 6th, 2009 at 3:26 pm
everybody whine and cry some more.
it’s pretty simple. newsfeed shows you popular items. livefeed shows you what’s happening NOW.
choose whichever you want it on. what is the big deal? they change a lot because they’re trying to make it better. everybody complained about the giant makeover but now everybody is fine with it.
i personally don’t mind this at all. it’s not rocket science. once i’m done looking at the newsfeed, which is anything popular like my friends getting tagged in pics or people commenting a lot on something, i can then go to the livefeed. if i don’t want to, i can just leave it on newsfeed. how does that affect any of you? don’t touch it if you don’t want to use the newsfeed/livefeed.
if it’s confusing to you, go back to myspace, that worthless POS.
November 6th, 2009 at 3:28 pm
oh, and to those complaining about farmville, etc…. just HIDE it. there’s an option for that so that it never shows up again in your feeds.
god it’s so simple i wonder what most of you do for a living. flip burgers much? or is that too much to handle? change in the menu??? OMG NOOOOO I DONT KNOW WHAT TO CHARGE FOR THE NEW APPLE PIE!!1?!;lihdsa;flkjas df
November 10th, 2009 at 2:57 am
Thats it regarding the difference and lots of thanks to you. I dint know the diff between this. I jus switch to two things and I prefer live feed more since it updates while the news feed doesnt.
November 13th, 2009 at 1:29 pm
Everyone seems to hate this new Facebook format, and I’m guessing everyone also wishes “T” would just shut the hell up. I don’t flip burgers for a living, I am an IT professional with various awards, and I had to come to this site to find out how Facebook works! They made News Feed (which was and still is the default) suddenly start filtering posts. I had no idea this was happening, so I was missing a lot of posts. Then I saw the Live Feed option on top and clicked it, and still did not know why I was now seeing a different set of posts. In my effort to find out, I ended up here. Now I know what Facebook has done, and Yes it is stupid, and “T” is stupid for not realizing that.
November 16th, 2009 at 9:10 pm
T is an idiot. No, I don’t flip burgers, and never have. I have two degrees and I am up on the latest technology. However, I DO NOT SPEND MY LIFE on facebook, and I too was a bit confused. I would prefer, personally, that NOTHING would be filtered out as I choose my own friends and I am interested in what they have to say. This news feed made me miss many posts. T, maybe you live on FB. Pop the pimples and go outside for a few minutes, it will do you good:)
November 17th, 2009 at 1:04 pm
why everytime i go to playing farmville i lose me feed i cany get my gifts or talk to other people me farmville button is gone where isit
November 17th, 2009 at 9:51 pm
I like the News Feed. It shows the updates I’m interested in immediately. I think people just need to get used to it the same way everyone needed to get used to the new versions of AIM when that was popular. Remember when Facebook introduced News Feed a few years back? The world was up in arms. Now it’s as though people depend on it. It seems like the designers of Facebook know the people better than the people know the people. Also, for a fair amount of those complaining, maybe you should stop spending so much time on Facebook in general and more time on schoolwork. Your grammar and spelling is atrocious.
November 17th, 2009 at 11:14 pm
Just confusing to have two “feeds”. After almost two weeks I still have no clue on which is which, and where the posts gone. No matter its free or not, it sucks.
November 24th, 2009 at 2:45 pm
I can’t stand that the birthdays are on bottom left. I have missed so many birthdays because of the new set-up. I just don’t think to look bottom left on my page….
November 27th, 2009 at 12:24 pm
Regardless of which you think is better, why not give the user a choice as to which they want as their default. Not everyone has 800 FB freinds.
December 1st, 2009 at 7:18 pm
Instead of making the changes that many people asked for. Facebook has yet again disregarded our wishes and continued down the same path. They’ve made Facebook much worse. What is the point of even complaining? They’ll just continue to do as they please anyway.
December 3rd, 2009 at 10:33 pm
What WTH is the point of having a live feed and a news feed? Just combine the stupid things, I agree, it seems redundant and too confusing. When I post something, it never shows on the news feed, only on the live feed. How do I know if my friends are even viewing the live feed and might miss what was posted. FB is getting worse every time they do something new to it.
December 9th, 2009 at 8:51 am
The new facebook is definitely not user friendly. I don’t know a single person who likes it. For sure I am not as in touch with my friends as I was with the old format. Things are posted by people all of the time that never are seen, or are hard to find later because there is so much crap to scroll past in order to find what you’re looking for. Status updates was perfect. Live feed/news feed ruined it – why mess with a good thing.
December 16th, 2009 at 8:35 am
In new facebook every time we have to refresh for new post view in news feed & live feed , earlier that not required. i think this has been done to reduce session traffic on facebook server but useless.
December 16th, 2009 at 8:39 am
in my case niether news feed update automatically or live feed update automatically. can anyone help me is there any settings for that or bug / restrictions by facebook technical team. Every time for new post you have to press refresh button that goes damage after several attempts to click on it.
December 18th, 2009 at 8:44 am
news feed sucks. a user should be defaulted to the live feed.
December 24th, 2009 at 11:17 pm
Why two feeds? I should have the option to combine them into one. Just plain dumb.
December 25th, 2009 at 1:14 pm
The issue isn’t so much whether or not the news feed sucks, it’s that the news feed is the default AND ONLY option. This leads me to think it must be a load balancing issue.
Network Design has implemented this over the objections of Usability. That’s my guess.
December 29th, 2009 at 5:14 pm
If you click on status updates button and hold it down, you can drag it above news feed and live feed and make it the default. Problem is alot of things don’t show in Status Updates either, but it is an option.
December 30th, 2009 at 10:42 am
I really hate the fact that whatever I write on someone’s wall, it gets posted on the live feed. It’s sooo annoying. I had a setting that made that impossible, and now, it’s all gone. Pls put it back!!
January 10th, 2010 at 8:58 pm
there are many things on Status Update that don’t appear on either News Feed or Live Feed. Whatt’s up with that? The same problem with posts on News Feed that are not on my Live Feed. agghh…end up having to check all of them.
January 14th, 2010 at 11:07 pm
I’m a professional web designer, and my #1 rule is that I always design my websites with two parties in mind – 1. my clients and 2. their end users. If the product is not satisfying the end user, in this case, Facebook users, then Facebook should take everyone’s input into consideration. I’ve seen a lot of people switch back to Myspace already, and I’ve even decided to routinely check up on mine again, and I’ve noticed they have made improvements since I last logged in around August 09. I still prefer facebook over Myspace though, due to the better performance, app support, and lack of obnoxious advertisements and spam. It would be nice though, to see Facebook redevelop their site so it could be more user-friendly.
January 15th, 2010 at 8:52 am
.There are a lot of hissy fits waiting to happen in these comments. The big poppa Facebook isn’t listening to its most precious children. Don’t like the new features? Cry about it. Just cry, okay? The world doesn’t love you anymore. You have been shunned and rejected. And of course, your opinions speak for everyone else. How dare Facebook not recognize your entitlement!?.
January 15th, 2010 at 5:29 pm
The change is lame as lame can be. (And don’t give us this dribble about how some people supposedly just don’t like change. Stupid. So in order to prove that we can deal with change and avoid this stupid accusation that we just don’t like change, we have to like every change that occurs no matter how idiotic. Learn to think, people.) Facebook keeps getting worse, not because it’s change, but because the changes are ill conceived and don’t reflect what fb users would like to see.
January 16th, 2010 at 12:30 am
Facebook has too much noise. From spam to game invites, to viewing who posted what to who’s wall to people gloating about their kids, it’s just a mess. Facebook = Garbage.
January 16th, 2010 at 12:42 am
its totally useless. i still dont get it and im smart :0)
click on it several times and it makes no sense….FB UI sucks so bad.
you would think there would be a few smart UI designers at FB.
January 20th, 2010 at 12:04 am
And, some computer decides what is important for me? I have posted some important things that I wanted people to know, but it stayed in the Live Feed while I had to look at all this junk about Farmsville and the results of the latest What Badass Historical Figure Are You? quiz. I posted about a health condition of a relative. Stayed in Live Feed. FB team is of absolutely no help. I have become so offended by this stupidity that I am taking a FB vacation and it might be permanent.
January 24th, 2010 at 3:51 pm
I really hate the fact that whatever I write on someone’s wall, it gets posted on the live feed. It’s sooo annoying. I had a setting that made that impossible, and now, it’s all gone. Pls put it back!!
January 31st, 2010 at 4:16 pm
Hey I got an idea! Why don’t they leave it the **** alone? :~)
For those lecturing those who complain: If someone implements a change that affects something you use, you have the right to complain. (get it?)
So let me see. In news feed, FB is deciding what is important to you (R they serious?). I’m not saying it isn’t well intended. Just as a person trying to go into the bathroom with you to help you with toiletry functions might not be malicious minded. Still, you have the urge to grab them by the sides of their head and scream ,”Just get the **** out!”
At least allow a person to set Live feed to the default!!!! But no, that foot keeps sticking into the door jam when you try to close the bathroom door.
Yes, if you write on someones wall…keep it there! don’t auto-broadcast it.
How is myspace lately?
honestly, have you ever been doing something when some well intended but slightly unhinged person insists on “helping”? You tell them no in a polite ,tactful manner a dozen times and they don’t get it until you scream in their face: “Sit the **** down and shut the ***** up!!!”
:~)
Please, if you must change FB to justify your jobs, SIMPLIFY it.
It’s like a ****ing christmas tree with 76 extention cords all jury rigged to each other.
how is the buiding material in the walls of FB able to insulate so well from reality itself?
February 7th, 2010 at 9:06 am
I hate the new facebook, live feed isn’t even working right, i’m not seeing the messages from all the people i used to and it keeps going back to “yesterdays” messages. Why change something that previously worked fine? Chat doesn’t work right, found a friend was receiving blank instead of text. So frustrated might give up on facebook!!
February 9th, 2010 at 8:37 am
ok, so the time they forced live feed on us, at least we had the optison of resetting the settings and put status update as default. The problem is, as far as I can tell, we can’t do that anymore. Is there any way of getting live/news feed to not be default and set status updates there instead? Cuz I don’t give a crap if people have “fed their animals” or joined a group protesting against “killing animals” or the such…
April 30th, 2010 at 10:54 am
[…] of Your Facebook Friends Web Add comments The one thing we can all count on with Facebook is change. Facebook performs major updates to its user interface about twice a year. Some changes […]
June 19th, 2010 at 10:57 am
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August 19th, 2010 at 2:54 pm
I have to add facebook live feed on my website and even users can login into the website with facebook account.
February 28th, 2011 at 1:50 pm
Unable to get live feed on home page. I need this to change friend list from 1000 to 5000.
April 13th, 2011 at 12:53 pm
I am very upset that I can’t get live feed anymore on my iphone! This means I can’t keep up with my games unless I am sitting at the computer! What’s the use! I will miss out on so much!
June 7th, 2011 at 2:28 pm
if any one commented on any ones photo i am not getting that comment on my newsfeed. and my comments are also not getting to any ones newsfeed.
July 26th, 2011 at 9:44 am
Omg, I hate top feed, they need to make the iphone default to the Live feed. No one cares about top new, I care about what is happening now.