Facebook users have come to expect changes in the social networking site whether they like it or not. Even though Facebook has received immense backlash for most of their changes, they continue to tweak the website to enhance the user experience of the website. Most of us have barely gotten used to the Facebook Timeline, but be prepared to encounter further changes to the Timeline.
Last November, a small percentage of users had all their posts aligned in one column instead of the usual two. The original format, as some users claimed, was uncomfortable to look at as users had to switch back and forth between two columns to see all the posts.
This change was however not expanded to other users later on. In December, 2012, a few users reported that their Timelines had tabs instead of thumbnails. This is a return to the tabs format that was present earlier. No more thumbnail pictures for “Photos”, “Friends” and “Map” options. In fact the “Map” option has now been removed from the front page and relegated under the “More” tab.
A new “About” tab has been added to the Timeline, clicking on which displays all the information the user has submitted to Facebook and his/her Friends lists. Moreover, the word “subscribers” has now been replaced with “followers”. A spokesperson for Facebook has announced that these new changes have been made to make it easier for users to navigate through their Timelines.
Today, these changes have been rolled out to Facebook users in New Zealand. As usual, Facebook has released these changes on a Wednesday and apart from the thumbnail pictures elimination change, New Zealand users can now see a “Collections Manager” feature. This feature allows user to customize everything that appears at the top of the Timeline and reorder the items in the right hand column such as “Likes”, “Notes”, “Photos”, etc. Not surprisingly, the reaction from Kiwis to these changes was mixed at best. Many have stated that these changes are unnecessary as their Timelines now look more like the original Facebook Wall.