Facebook has been testing a feature that separates friends’ posts from public pages’ in six countries, but it says there are no current plans to roll the test out further.
The test is a response to user complaints about clogged News Feeds that are now filled with the likes of memes and recipe videos rather than friends’ personal updates.
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In Sri Lanka, Bolivia, Slovakia, Serbia, Guatemala, and Cambodia, Facebook currently has two tabs: one for the common News Feed, which is purely personal posts from friends, and one called Explore, with posts from pages.
This “Explore” tab is different in other parts of the world, where it provides information Facebook believes would be of interest to a user.
“We will hear what people say about the experience to understand if it’s an idea worth pursuing any further,” the company says.
Despite speculation to the contrary, the company says it won’t be charging pages for space on the News Food or Explore tabs.
While it may be exciting to hear Facebook is considering heading back to its roots, it does beg the question: How much do we actually want to see our friends posts? Are you ready for the influx of bad takes? Because I’m sure not.
