Facebook solicits user feedback
Via the Facebook Blog, a “Sneak Preview” group has been setup to introduce upcoming design changes and features. Personally, the new design changes look great to me. The redesigned navigation sports an Inbox, replacing messages and shares. Messages now more closely mirror emails with the capability to have multiple recipients and threaded conversations. Individual pages have been overhauled and each network now has a central page with demographics and trends among other information.
In light of the backlash from the News Feed changes, TechCrunch’s Arrington comments that the Sneak Preview group will help to “build consensus and dissolve criticism” around changes. He also makes the (somewhat unsupported) assertion that if Facebook were to sell it would go for more than YouTube. More coverage at VentureBeat as well.
The real power in Facebook is the user data they have aggregated. Users volunteer information about their favorite books, music, movies and more. Although advertisements are somewhat personalized, I think that Facebook could be doing a good deal more to tailor advertisements to user preferences. For example, if I indicated I was a fan of The Departed, it would be valuable to see an announcement when the DVD came out–maybe with a $5 off coupon. Targeted advertisements of this nature are very similar to what Google does with search, it seems a logical extension.
On a side note, Signal vs. Noise called Facebook’s privacy settings “overkill.” As a Facebook user, I’d tend to disagree that the icons serve no value. Being able to have granular control over your privacy is a necessary feature in this case. Not to mention, I like the icons.
[...] This is another way Facebook is reaching out to users, something I recently talked about here and on [...]