The New Home Page
The, set to go live by the middle of next week, is anchored by the newly named Stream (previously known as the News Feed). The Facebook Stream shows your friends' activity as it occurs, with automatic refreshing built into the page. The status update box, now branded as Publisher, simply asks: "What's on your mind?" Any text, photos, or video entered into it go straight into your profile and onto your friends' home pages at the same time.
The revamped page features added filters as well. The filters give you greater control over what you see in the Stream, letting you choose to see updates from only specific users or specific sources. If you'd rather not see content that comes from particular applications, for example, you can opt to filter it out.
As , Facebook also revealed plans to tweak its . Those pages will now mimic the look of personal profiles, allowing companies to send status updates and other information directly into users' streams without previously imposed restrictions.
Expanding Options
The changes are the latest efforts by Facebook to expand its offerings and match features made popular by other online social services. Just last month, the site to "like" your friends' content -- a concept most often associated with social aggregation service . Add into that the launch last December of Facebook's Web-wide sign-on system, , and it's easy to see how near-ubiquity could be right around the corner. The company's of an over its only adds to the positive (albeit nearly hampered) momentum.
Recent estimates put Facebook when it comes to social network traffic. Some analyses show Facebook drawing of its nearest competitor, the much more seasoned MySpace. Even the co-founder of MySpace's original parent company is in Facebook's favor.
User: Facebook. Status update: Darn near domination.