I hate change! Well, unless it was MY idea.
This morning a friend posted on Facebook about how she loves Facebook except when they change things. Of course, the change is inevitable. Facebook is a young company and improving its product is a key part of its strategy. There is no real way around it.
Of course sometimes it would be great if they told you and let you vote on some of the changes. Having messages lose their subject line was probably necessary for the way Facebook has integrated its chat and messaging system. But it doesn’t work on any broad sense to have everything you ever wrote to one person become one long conversation. That’s fine for now. Three years from now when you want to scan your interaction with that person to find the message where they gave you the link to some important piece of information you want, you are going to get a little nuts.
One thing is good. I teach Facebook and I constantly rely on their help system. No one has asked yet, but someday I think someone will ask “Don’t you just know how to do stuff? Why do you look in the Help section for everything?” The answer is simple. I knew how they did it LAST week. So how is this good? Simple. Facebook always updates their help information. If the button that used to be on the top is somewhere else now, Facebook’s Help will have been changed to direct you to the new location. That is a great comfort.
It’s all about the Google.
Right now, Facebook is trying to launch a slew of products before Google can scramble its Google+ system into a full public rollout. I know, Google already failed with Buzz so what’s the big deal? Well, the big deal is that any company with that level of cash and technology is a formidable opponent. And Facebook has already aligned itself clearly in the “enemy camp” when it comes to Google. So now is the time to roll out so many improvements that people will embrace and not be willing to give up. Roll them out too soon and Google could copy them. Wait too long and Google might overtake you.
Still, Mark Zuckerberg is doing something right. He’s the most popular person on Google+ and now he’s going to ship a bunch of new Fancy Facebook. Watch for updates.