The New Facebook

Social networking Web site Facebook.com unveiled its new user layouts for profiles this week. The interface overhaul marks a new version of Facebook that takes the social network profile to a different level. What it lacks in customization is redeemed with a sleek interface - but that doesn't mean there aren't a few problems.

The New Facebook: What's Different

The new home page attempts to be more accessible with quicker links to common tasks, such as status updates ("Iris is trying out the new Facebook profile") and adding photos. The News Feed is still around and displays what friends are up to, their status updates, events and Posted Items (such as links and videos) - but a couple of things have been rearranged and restructured.

Status Updates, Bookmarks, Sponsors and Birthdays now have more prominence on the home page, since all of these features are now collapsed into one wider box on the right of the page. Bookmarks and Sponsors have been moved from the left of the page and placed beneath Status Updates. The People You May Know feature (a tragically pointless addition to the page) remains along with an invitation link and a friend-finding link, also features found on the old version of the Facebook profile.

Upon a close look, users can see that lines used to frame the News Feed have been eliminated. There is less of a "boxy" feel within the new profile and there is a greater amount of white space on the page. But with the added white space, there is certainly a greater influx of images, including user icons that accompany comments on posted items. Before, users would see only the number of comments posted to a shared item.

The links at the top-right corner of the page have been reduced; the Settings link, when clicked, collapses a menu for two options of settings preferences for users to tinker with: Account Settings and Privacy Settings (an area Facebook has had trouble with upon introducing the Feeds).

The biggest change, however, comes with the introduction of tabs on a user profile page. A new feature called The Publisher is also added, allowing quick updates to a user's status, photos, notes and more.

The New Facebook: What's Good

Frankly, this is going to be difficult to write because I've found less good than bad with the new Facebook. The profile has certainly been streamlined, presenting a new clean interface for users to navigate. The Publisher feature is nice, giving users a faster way of updating statuses. The Photo tab under The Publisher is particularly nice; with one click a user can create an album, post a photo or even take a photo, provided there is access to a webcam.

The Wall, interestingly enough, is now divided into three parts; new filters have been added for the Wall feature, allowing users to simply display posts "Posts by Others" or posts by the user. The default setting includes both options combined, but if users desire the traditional wall, then selecting "Posts by Others" would be best. Miniature profile photos of those who post on the Wall remain with this setting, although Wall posts have been restructured with fewer boxes. Highlighting a Wall post with the cursor prompts an Edit icon to appear to the right of the post; this gives users the option to delete the Wall post. The "Write on [Name's] Wall" link has been completely removed, while the Wall-to-Wall feature has been kept.

The New Facebook: What's Wrong

The new interface, initially, seems less cluttered; after all, tabs have been placed at the top of the profile for key features such as the Wall, user information, photos and a few applications that are placed on the profile page as the user selected. Tasks have also been collapsed into different tabs, allowing users to switch between updating statuses, writing notes and adding photos to albums.

But there's a flaw in this interface: the Mini-Feed consumes the entire profile. What is known as the Mini-Feed on the old version of Facebook's profile page extends itself to the entire page, including posts made on a user's Wall. The initial profile page is no longer really about the user, but more so about what the user does and interactions with friends. Status updates are mixed with Wall posts and now, Wall posts are displayed in their entireties with photos (and time stamps) alongside. For me, the photos add too much unnecessary images to the profile, which already has miniature icons of friends to the left of the page, my profile photo at the top and links I share with my buddies (which often carry pictures).

The info tab displays basic information (networks, birthday, hometown, relationship stats, political views and religious views) and personal information (activities, interests and favorite pastimes). There is also contact, education and work information as well as a list of links to fan pages and groups users join online through Facebook ("1,000,000 Strong for Content Producers!" No? Aw, c'mon!). This tab is reminiscent of Facebook Mobile: extremely bland, blank and limited. There is too much white space surrounding the blocks of lists. I don't see myself clicking on this tab often, unless it's to update information.

The Photos tab organizes pictures by ... I'm not sure. There are two divisions of photos: on the bottom, photos are listed by album, with one photo representing each album just as before. Meanwhile, at the top photos are sorted in (I think) reverse chronological order. The most recent photos uploaded are displayed first. (Feel free to correct me if this isn't the case.)

The Boxes tab just seems to operate as the carpet under which users sweep stuff (ie. Applications). It serves only to put some applications "away" from the rest of the profile. Users can add more tabs of content (but for what reason I do not know).

To sum up: the new Facebook profile is a complete makeover. But traditionalist users (like myself) need not fret - a link that reads "Back to the old Facebook" at the top-right corner of the page will lead users back to the original version of the profile page. Users who wish to try out the new profile can visit www.new.facebook.com.

The two profile versions were examined on two different browsers - Firefox and Safari - on a Mac running OS X/Leopard.