12.07.2010

What's on your mind?

How many times have we all answered this innocuous question? It is, of course, the question asked when users log into Facebook. However, it’s a question we will see a lot less frequently with the new design.

It was while posting yesterday that I noticed you are no longer greeted with a big text box just waiting for your response to the familiar question on the Facebook homepage. Instead you are required to click a Status icon at the top of your News Feed in order to share your thoughts with the world. It's a small change, but at the same time pretty significant.

I have no data or studies to back this up, but I'm willing to bet when a person sees the question "What's on your mind?" the brain is already formulating an answer subconsciously. The big empty text-box also invites you to fill it, making it practically second nature to contribute to the stream of social chatter. With these cues gone, it now requires a completely conscious action to post a status update.

Already I’m noticing fewer updates on my newsfeed since the change, I can only imagine the trend will continue as the new layout continues to roll out. Don’t get me wrong; my feed is still buzzing with new photos, articles and app updates. It’s just the text-only content disappearing.

I'm not yet sure what the implications are of this change of functionality, but it feels like a big reversal from a couple years ago when Facebook appeared to be emulating Twitter. Instead of competing with other social networks, there’s now bigger fish to fry – as sharing replaces searching as the preferred method of finding new content, is Facebook positioning itself to be the next Google? The prevalence of ‘Like’ buttons all over the Internet seems to back-up this idea. Whatever the meaning is, this seemingly minor UI change makes me wonder what’s on their mind?