More Facebook Changes: Bring on the New Facebook Timeline!

For the longest time I have disliked the “new” Facebook look. New meaning the changes that they made back in March. I wrote 5 Things Facebook Needs to Change Back Right Now, at that time. I absolutely hated the look of the profile page. Since then, we have gotten used to little Facebook pages here and there. It’s become a way of life, and an ongoing joke. As soon as you get used to how something works on Facebook, they change it.

Well, over the past 2 days, Facebook has made some major changes, and more are being implemented right now. They have to step up their game with Google+ riding on their coat tails and threatening to take away some users. Yesterday when we logged in we were presented with several new changes:

The Newsfeed now puts the most popular stories at the top of your feed. You can choose to collapse that box and bring your most recent posts to the top. You can also choose to promote a post to a top story.

Each top story is marked with a little blue triangle in the left had corner to let you know that story is a top story.

The Ticker shows up on the right above the chat box. This is a real-time streaming view of what your friends are up to. See something of interest? Hover over it to bring up more details or click on the users page.

The ticker seems to be the most disliked part of the new design (so far). But it does not bother me too much. At first I was a little annoyed, but it really is a good way to get a quick view of what is going on. I have clicked on a few things there today. And, it is easy enough to hide the ticker by using a couple of advertised plugins for Google Chrome.

There have been other small changes here or there over the past couple of weeks like changes on the way photos are displays and more sharing options.

Today, during Facebook’s F8 Developers Conference, CEO Mark Zuckerberg, unveiled more new changes that are rolling out to developer’s immediately and regular users over the next few weeks. The most exciting of these changes is the new Timeline view which gives you more control over what your profile looks like, what is included, and what your friends see.

The first thing that I said was that it was similar to a past Myspace design. Although it is much, much better looking. Some notable features include the cover pic which is a full width photo that you can use to showcase a pic about yourself. You have the ability to arrange your Timeline how you want it and to showcase what you want your friends to see. It was also stated that over 350 million users access Facebook via mobile per month, so Timeline looks great on your mobile as well.

For a full preview of the Timeline, and to sign up to get notified when it is available for beta use, check out this page. And if you are interested in watching the whole Keynote, click here.

There were also many updates announced to Open Graph including more options for interfacing with other opps. Announcements also included improved integrations for Netflix, Spotify, and iHeart Radio. This will allow users to discover more content and new ways to share with their friends.

I usually embrace change. After all, look at what I do for a living. I will be one of the first to switch over when available to give it a try. I know some others do not like change no matter what and will avoid it like the plague.

What do you think of the upcoming changes? Are you looking forward to it? Or do you like Facebook the way it is (or not)?

UPDATE: I forgot to add, as with any Facebook changes people are worried about security. Here is my usual tip “If you do not want people to know, don’t put it on the internet.”