Facebook updates are coming in droves this year as the website looks to maintain it’s stranglehold over the industry. Recent changes such as messaging threads and music capabilities are proof of that. Once again, they’re updating the algorithm which controls what’s in our news feeds. As a result, we should expect to see more close-friend statuses and relevant links in our feeds very soon.
In preparation for this Facebook update, they’re analyzing data from a series of surveys dating back to last year. One such survey focuses on user responses to who their closest friends are. Additionally, responses to questions about what users consider relevant links are being included in the update. Intentionally, they look to create a more personalized experience for each user. A spokesperson offered this explanation to Engadget about the project:
“In terms of conclusions, there isn’t one trend here that we were seeing overall for people as (…to) what makes a post worth someone’s time, or who someone is close to, unique to every person. That’s why surveying users and building this model was so important, because it gives us a new signal to capture what may be valuable for people at a more individual, granular level.”
Overall, this latest Facebook update looks to be positive for the social networking site. Users notoriously fret about the lack of relevancy in news feeds and this should help fix that issue. Although, we should all be accountable for managing friends lists too. The spokesperson goes on to admit this update wouldn’t eliminate clutter completely. Nor, would any noticeable change take hold immediately as they are phasing this Facebook update in slowly. Thus, pages and sponsored-post users need not freak out just yet. Hopefully, Facebook will continue focusing on enriching the user experience as more updates roll out.