During 2011, Facebook performed major changes to its layout. In August, Facebook’s photo viewer was changed from black to white, flushing out anything around a viewed picture. The video button was hidden under your photos and the link button as well as the comment boxes changed. Your accounts’ privacy settings were also changed.
Like all media and social networks, Facebook continues to quest through the “cycle of social networks.” Beginning with the “new and cool” stage, to the “kind of popular” stage, then to the “really popular” stage, and finally to the “Justin Bieber popular stage.” Ending with an advertisement and spam take over just as Myspace had. Facebook will dangle in social networking for a few more years, and like Justin Bieber, will always occupy a few leisurely fans, consisting mostly of adolescent preteen girls who have gone psycho with a camera and the peace sign.
But I give Facebook props. The new changes have made it easier to “freep” (Facebook creep) on your friends. The modified privacy settings also make it harder for that guy you clicked “not now” for twice already to see what you’ve been up to.
For most of us, “creeping” seems to be the only thing that Facebook is useful for lately. Facebook’s photo viewer increased by eight times overall and its resolution changed from 720 pixels to 2048 pixels. “I’m thankful for the photo changes,” says an anonymous creeper, “it helps you creep by enlarging the picture and making it easier to determine the attractiveness of the person.”
Hardly complaining about the new photo enhancement, Facebook’s 750 million users disapprove other new features such as the ticker.The ticker feature appears in the upper right hand corner on the home page and streams live activities. Users protest their guts out just as many had in 2006 when the news feed was first launched. But today, the feed is one of Facebook’s most popular features.
But is Facebook’s new “ticker” screaming “Twitter” to you? The corporation’s intentions are to stream your friends’ activity and to provide you access to the private posts of people who you’re not friends with. So documenting things has become that incredibly necessitated in social networking today? Yes, this is why twitter has become overbearingly popular in the last year or so.
Similar to the past rivalry between Facebook and Myspace that began in 2004, Facebook and Twitter seem to be sharing and stealing users. Due to Facebook’s organized pages and features compared to Myspace’s bold, overbearing fonts, and its inability to appeal to parents or grandparents as Facebook does, it hit rock bottom after users left and was gobbled up by advertisement and spam websites.
Not only has Twitter become a major social networking site in the past few years, but a database for historical and current events including protests and revolts in the Middle East, especially in Egypt and Libya. Twitter appeals to people of all ages and allows you to follow celebrities rather than liking celebrities’ pages. But other than becoming helpful for the documentation of worldly events, the network has become useful for business companies and journalists as well. Both New York and Los Angeles Times have Twitter accounts. Instead of grabbing the paper every day, why not just check up on daily or even worldly news via Twitter?
I could easily conclude that twitter was created to allow you to see what other people are doing, expanding beyond only the people you know. But I continue to give Facebook props as a social networking website as well. Both websites are useful for documenting, which continues to become more popular today. Deciding whether to use Twitter versus Facebook ultimately depends on who you would like to creep on and how you would enjoy doing so.