My Facebook Friends React to FB 3.0

It’s been over a week since Facebook launched a new layout. Reaction to change is always interesting, but the social media giant appears to be interested in feedback with the special Facebook Layout Vote. So far (as of March 19, 2009) over 408,000 people have left a comment, and it doesn’t bode well for the new look.

The new interface makes it difficult to prune through your friend’s Status Updates. If you want to find a given text, say “Facebook Changes,” you really have no way of doing it. Here is some of what I found from my own friends.

• E.M. from Chicago wrote, “It is not user-friendly. In fact, it is not friendly at all.”
• W.F. from Birmingham wrote, “The personal home and profile pages seem clunky and require a lot of work to navigate. And the fan pages just plain suck. No more videos? What’s up with that?”
• D.C. from Savannah wrote, “How many ways can I say ‘no’? It is harder to track groups of which you are a member. There are too many issues to address. Two words—’New Coke!!!’

The Good

The News Feed shows me updates from all of my friends. The older version only showed me a sample. Unfortunately, I have close to 500 friends, so my News Feed is faster than an F1 car. Thankfully, there are filter buttons.

The Bad

The Highlights Bar is just annoying. I’m not into groups, so this feed is completely irrelevant for me.

How can I remove it?

The Ambivalent

The new photo boxes attached to the feed is nice.

Here are other articles I have written on this topic:

• U.S. Military Establishes New Social Media Policy
• 10 Day Tune Up for H1N1 – Day 7: Social Media Checklist
• Using Social Media to Promote Your Charity
• What to Do When 100,000 People on Facebook Hate You
• What Twitter’s DoS Attack Can Teach Us
• Would You See a Movie that a Facebook Friend Hated?
• Using Social Media in a Public Health Emergency
• Is Facebook Becoming TweetBook?
• What You Should Know About Advertising on Facebook
• What Tradition PR Can Achieve That PR 2.0 Can Not