Facebook Is Killing Off Trending As It Tries To Revamp Newsfeed

Mark Wilson writes: Facebook has announced plans to kill off the Trending feature of its newsfeed. The social network says that this is to "make way for future news experiences." Over the years, Facebook has experimented endlessly with the presentation of news, and has faced criticism for failing to weed out "fake news" and also accusations of liberal bias. Now the company wants to find new ways to help people find news that matters to them, ensuring that it comes from reliable sources.

Re:

[SirCowMan]

moo!

Fuck Newsfeed and Fuck Facebook

[Anonymous Coward]

We don't WANT a newsfeed on Facebook. AT ALL. We want to find out what are friends are doing. WE DON'T GO TO FACEBOOK FOR NEWS!

Just show us our friends posts, let us screen out the political garbage, and stop switching from Most Recent to "Top Stories" EVERY! FREAKING! TIME! we log on!

Why is this so hard for Facebook to understand

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[jellomizer]

I need to agree. Is is a shame you used an Anonymous Coward post, as this will not get moderated to a level it deserves.

The reason why Facebook took over MySpace was due to its simplicity. Making things more and more complex. Makes using Facebook a chore vs. Something fun.

I will get ads, most likely targeted based on what my friends and myself post. But that is expected from a free service. But news feeds, political stuff, and having to see over and over again one of my friends popular post, where I a

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[rikkards]

I have no issue per se for Ad based service, I DO have issue with seeing ads I have already marked as not relevant or not interested already.

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[corbettw]

having to see over and over again one of my friends popular post, where I am more interested in what is happening with my more boring friend.

This is one of the things that eventually forced me to shutdown Facebook for good. I got sick and tired of seeing the same posts over and over. Then I'd switch from "most popular" to "newest", and what do know? There were tons of posts that I never saw because Facebook declined to include them in my feed.

Just let me see what I want to see, not what you think I should see.

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[Anonymous Coward]

... let us screen out the political garbage, ...

Yeah, right. Political garbage took off because people kept sharing it and re-posting it.

Political garbage took off because people like just hearing what they want to hear. They want to live in their little bubbles and feel that they are right about everything.

It's emotionally painful to see and accept the truth when it runs against one's world view that they are attached to. And very few people are willing to challenge their own beliefs.

So, fb ending news feed won't do a goddamn bit of difference.

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[Anonymous Coward]

If you don't understand why Facebag is pushing propaganda

But Zuck didn't want us to elect a Cheeto. The stuff Facebook likes is American left-wing.
The stuff that allegedly got us in this mess flew right under their radar due to money and the Al Gore Rhythm.

Re:Fuck Newsfeed and Fuck Facebook

[MobyDisk]

While I agree, the problem is that lots and lots of people *do* go to Facebook for news. And the people who use Facebook for news, are the least discerning news readers, so they share the stupidest most flamebaitish "fake" news, which causes a recursive singularity of stupidity, and is why Facebook is in so much trouble. But since sooo many people like to log in and share news, and that gets them so much attention and ad revenue, they aren't going to take that feature away.

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[Anonymous Coward]

WE DON'T GO TO FACEBOOK FOR NEWS!

I think you're confused about what the Facebook Newsfeed originally did. It started out showing you what was new that your friends had posted. i.e. "what [our] friends are doing". Then friends started posting mainstream-news items and they became liked/shared so much that Facebook thought everyone wanted to see them. That's where the problem started. Eventually, FB set up a system where people could pay cash to have their ads labeled as "trending on facebook", so you weren't even seeing the trends amon

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[sconeu]

Thank you!!!!

Facebook should be embarrassed that the need for FB Purity exists

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[DaFallus]

and stop switching from Most Recent to "Top Stories" EVERY! FREAKING! TIME! we log on!

To me, this is one of the most irritating aspects of actually trying to use Facebook. Every single time you view your feed it is something different. Good luck going back and finding something a friend of yours "liked".

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[jtgd]

Not only do I want to see things chronologically, I want it in FORWARD chronological order, not BACKWARDS chronological order. It only makes sense to see things in the order they are posted. I want to see everything exactly ONCE, and I don't want to miss anything, so I'd like to pick up where I left off and progress towards the present. But no, they make ME try to remember if I read something when I get to it. Isn't remembering things like that what computers are supposed to do for us? I guess what I really

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[jrumney]

In case it wasn't clear to any Facebook employees reading, see this story [slashdot.org] from earlier in the week, and some [yahoo.com] of your predecessors [myspace.com] that have gone this route before. You are living in a bubble - please raise the alarm to the others in there with you before it pops.

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[Stinky Cheese Man]

You can show Most Recent all the time by bookmarking https://www.facebook.com/?sk=h_chr

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[ayesnymous]

That's why I created a list and put all my friends in it. I just go to the list and it shows all my friends' posts in chronological order.

I can hardly wait for my

[oldgraybeard]

"future news experiences." oh wait, I don't have a Facebook account. Guess I wil just settle for real news the old fashioned way.

Just my 2 cents ;)

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[Impy the Impiuos Imp]

"Which ad experience would you prefer?"

I will put the window in the background and go do something else until it times out is what I prefer, along with the death of people who think up abominations like that.

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[JaredOfEuropa]

If a company is trying to sell you on an “experience”, you can be sure that you are getting raped somehow. The only question is in which orifice...

Re:

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:Balanced or liked

[Train0987]

You confuse "news" with editorial opinion. Facts don't appeal to any one group over another. Some of us just want straight facts so we can form our own opinions. The media and these social media monopolies are trying to control opinion by disguising their agendas as fact.

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[Anonymous Coward]

More insidious is the cherry-picking of facts. My daughter did a science fair project on fake news this week, and she watched ten hours each of MSNBC and Fox News. Both stations generally presented facts even though Fox did a lot of editorialization/option pieces, but they were clearly presented as such. The problem was that there was very little overlap on the facts they presented.

A good example was Trey Gowdy's recent statement:

“I am even more convinced that the FBI did exactly what my fellow cit

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[Chris Mattern]

Some of us just want straight facts so we can form our own opinions.

Not possible. "The straight facts" is too much data for one person to assimilate. They must be filtered to produce something you can conceivably finish. So who do you want filtering your facts, since they must be filtered?

Myspace, AOL, Facebook

[p51d007]

Fall out of favor with the younger generation, and they move on to something else. If you don't use a blocker on FB, you get bombed with garbage in your "news feed" I just use uBlock to create block scripts and block all the garbage. Kids & ADVERTISERS will shift to instagram, snapchat or whatever is "hip and trendy" with the kids, because to advertisers, THAT is where the money is.

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[xxxJonBoyxxx]

^^^ This. Might as well call it "mombook". Everyone else but constantly bitter people left a long time ago. (Kids too - no one wants their mom to see what they're really up to.)

They still couldn't control the narrative

[Archangel Michael]

Facebook and other Tech companies want to control the narrative. Once you control the narrative, you control the people.

The problem is, that once you start issuing controls on the narrative, it becomes easier to spot those controls, and even circumvent them. That is part of the reason why Facebook is starting its downward trend. People, even ones that might like the narrative, don't want to be spoon fed preprocessed baby food news.

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[Train0987]

You just described Slashdot's collapse.

Re:

[syn3rg]

I agree. Also, who decides what is reliable?
"Quis custodiet ipsos custodes"?

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[Archangel Michael]

I can decide what is reliable for my own world view. You may differ on that, as I may differ with your views. But I don't want to control what you decide for yourself. I'd rather be open and influence you, but control? Nahhh

I would not trust Facebook

[FudRucker]

Facebook is trying to rebuild their respect after the big debacle about the fake news, and other crap, but i think they are incapable of being trustworthy, as soon as the next election draws near they are going to ramp up the bias and mud slinging and all the other dirty shenanigans that go with US politics, you facebook members are a product to be used for profits thats all you are to facebook, and thats all you will ever be to facebook

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[jrumney]

I always thought the fake news debacle was about the viral crap that friends share. I didn't know they had started posting actual news stories to the feed. My feed was always set to "Most Recent" since they introduce the rubbish "Top Stories" feed that shows me everything I don't want to see and nothing I do want. But lately they keep switching the feed to "Top Stories" if I log in on a PC, so I see a handful of my friends posts followed by an endless scroll of news stories. For now, the mobile web interfa

There is no truth in news

[RandomFactor]

Trending could be useful in its own right if they just wouldn't screw with it. Sadly curating is all the rage with FaceTwitTube.

In related news ...

[fahrbot-bot]

News of Facebook not trending now trending - except on Facebook, where trending is not trending.

"Future News Experiences"

[ausekilis]

Holy crap! They're gonna predict the future!

I estimate:
Another 2-3 days before some other inane Apple news
1 for Microsoft
4 for Tesla
Tomorrow will have another Trump tale, within another few months there will be another Kardashian in the White House. Likely with a reality show, "Keeping up with Celebrity Apprentice, YOU'RE FIRED Edition"
  it's gonna be another 2 weeks before another mass shooting (at current 2018 rate)

Easy fix

[sixsixtysix]

Just leave "Most Recent" as default ffs.