If you have updated to the new Facebook timeline, you've probably noticed that there is now a big space across the top of your profile or page to put a very short and wide photo. This is a little awkward to deal with at first, because we've become accustomed to making our photos for our social networks either square or cropped to "profile" view (slightly taller than it is wide).
This one, however, is meant to be 850 pixels wide x 315 pixels tall - or it can be cropped to those dimensions after it's uploaded to Facebook. Basically, it's going to either be a panoramic photo, a collage, or a true "header" like you might have on an older-style personal blog.
If your page or profile is public, it needs to be appropriate for all audiences (i.e. keep it "G" rated), and you can only include "advertising" type material on a page (not on a personal profile). Pages are meant to be more for businesses or organizations or non-profits. The photos should not include any text that is meant to be hyperlinked, because at this time there is not a way to do that in the profile or page headers.
If you're looking for ideas, Honkiat.com (Part 1 and Part 2) has the best collection of timeline covers I've seen so far.
The important thing to remember is that this space is OPTIONAL. There's a lot to be said for the simplicity of just letting your profile image stand alone in this space (this will happen automatically), and leaving white space at the top of the page, like Tim and the gang at WebRev are doing right now. This strategy will achieve a much more professional look than just hastily sticking ANY old photo you can find in that space.
While the real news of this acquisition is that it was reported for One Billion Dollars (with a "B"), which is HUGE for a start-up application that just finally rolled out to (Google's) Android devices last week. Previously, it had only been available on (Apple's) iPhones.
Why was Facebook willing to pay so much? My guess is that Facebook wanted to get it before Google scooped it up. Critics are concerned that Facebook primarily wanted the user data from Instagram. This seems unlikely, however, because although Instagram had its own social network, its primary purpose to be used as a tool to filter photos prior to uploading to Facebook and Twitter. Ergo, most of the users probably already had Facebook, and were already sharing their photos on Facebook or another social network. And, of course the Twitterverse is going nuts - as per usual. Even the reaction among Facebook users is mixed, and hysterical.
OK, here's the deal. Facebook is a for-profit company, and so is (was) Instagram. So are all of their competitors. They are going to make business decisions that they hope will make them as much money as possible, and keep them in business as long as possible. This is how business works, and that's what this acquisition was - a business decision. I think it was probably a good one all of the way around, and I'm very happy for the folks at Instagram who has the business acumen to develop a great program that turned out to be worth $1B.
Now, let's all calm down, and save our energy for the habitual outrage that is sure to ensue as soon as one of these media giants buys the other photo-related time-sink, Pinterest.
Ars Technica has confirmed what a lot of us have suspected for a long time, that Facebook photos may never be truly "deleted" from Facebook's servers. That's the bad news.
The good news is that unless you're famous enough (or infamous) enough that people are actually linking to your Facebook photos from their e-mail or other places on the web, it is unlikely that anyone will see those "deleted" photos. It's also good news that as of this time, they can't be searched by your name. Finally, you may be relieved to know that this primarily applies to photos on Facebook - not comments or posts on Facebook.
So, how would the photos be found? By the image file (ending in .jpg) that is associated with that photo. You can find the link to the image file for just about any photo on the web by right-clicking on the photo, then selecting "properties," or "image properties," as your browser allows. Although it's a little more tedious, you can also find the link by clicking "view" at the top of your browser, then "source," then scrolling through to find the image file you're looking for.
With that image file address, it is possible to view images that may have been deleted from the site they were originally posted on - until the images are finally deleted from the server. Apparently, Facebook is not highly motivated to purge these old deleted files at this time (and why would they? Remember who their paying customers are).
Bottom line? This is a good time for a reminder not to post ANYTHING on the web you wouldn't want everyone in the world to see - including your family, friends, and potential customers or clients. Even if you have second thoughts and delete the content, you never know what that stuff could come back to haunt you.
As someone who managed to get herself divorced twice before I had a Facebook account (and zero times since I've been on Facebook), I'm a bit skeptical.
Facebook is a social networking tool - nothing more. Before we had Facebook, we had MySpace, and before that Yahoo and AOL, and before that we had dating services, and before that we had the church and local dance clubs. People (married or unmarried) who have a mind to flirt have always somehow found a way to do it. But now, it happens on Facebook, because most of the civilized world is on Facebook.
If the divorce rate had dramatically increased since Facebook became popular, one could plausibly make a connection between the family breakdown and social networking, but the fact is that the divorce rate is down, both in the United Kingdom, and in the United States.
Perhaps instead of blaming Facebook for the divorces that are occurring, we should give Facebook credit for keeping more people at home with their spouses? That might also be an exaggeration, but Facebook does provide a tool (when used properly) to improve communication, which is important in a good marriage (or so I'm told).
Regardless, it seems like it would be wiser to pay more attention to what people are doing ON Facebook, rather than blaming the site, itself for the breakdown in any relationship (or the success of one).
Happy Friday, everyone - have a great weekend. Now, go hug your spouse if you still have one - good ones are hard to find.
I'll bet you're all wondering what I've been doing for the last several days. Well, let me tell you.
I finished up my Christmas shopping on Sunday, which is the most important thing, but not really what I'm here to talk about. I'm just really, really happy to be done with that.
Last Thursday night I happened to be on Facebook late when I noticed in that little ticker on the right side of the screen that one of my clients was posting comments on his friends' walls. At first I was really happy to see this, because this particular client is a bit shy when it comes to using Facebook, but then my excitement quickly turned to panic when I saw what kind of comments these were. They were poorly spelled (my client is a very good writer and typist), repetitive (this client was supposedly posting the exact same comment on everyone's wall), and they included a rather dubious-looking link.
Uh, oh. This client had been hacked. What should I do?
I had to act quickly to minimize the damage (i.e. - this client's friends clicking on the link and spreading the virus that way), and embarrassment to my client. Fortunately, I sometimes help this person with Facebook, so I had access to the profile account. I signed in and immediately checked to see if there were any suspicious apps that had recently been added or used. There weren't.
The other common way this virus gains access to a person's profile is if that person sees such a link somewhere on Facebook (or perhaps in the e-mail notifications) and clicks on the link while signed in to Facebook. I later spoke to my client, who informed me that had not happened, either, so we still don't know how the virus attacked this profile.
I immediately changed the password, and requested my client to log out of Facebook everywhere - home, work, mobile, etc., then sign back in as needed using the new password. We then started the damage control, by deleting every post we could find with that link. That is time-consuming, but not nearly as much so as answering a bunch of e-mails and explaining repeatedly to numerous clients and friends would have been. Fortunately, within a couple of hours, Facebook had blocked that particular virus, and the last posting we saw of it on anyone's account was about midnight Central Standard Time on Thursday night / Friday morning. We think we have all of the offending posts deleted. Fortunately, these types of viruses usually infect only the Facebook profile, and not the computers used to access the profile.
The moral of the story? I think we all know this, but considering these nasty viruses are still going around, a reminder might be in order:
1) Don't click on any "weird" links, that go to a domain name you don't recognize, or that look out of character for the friend who sent you the link or supposedly posted it.
2) If you do manage to get a spam virus, immediately change your password, and log out of Facebook on all of your computers and mobile devices. You can log back in when you need to with the new password.
3) As much as possible, delete the offending posts, so your friends and their friends and their friends don't click on them and spread the virus far and wide. If it is not possible (i.e., you have 5,000 friends on Facebook), then do what you can to alert everyone and apologize. For example, you might send a message to your friends, and/or post a note to your profile warning everyone about the link.
Above all, don't act as if it's the end of the world. It's not. It happens to most of us at least once, and more than that if we spend a lot of time online. Just do what you can to minimize the damage, and get back on that proverbial virtual horse. Happy (safe) Facebooking!
First, I like the fact that Facebook gives users a chance to preview the new look for up to seven days before publishing it. This gives us time to review what people will actually be able to see, including things we may have forgotten about because they're so far down in our history. The security settings for who is able to see what do not change from the old look to the new.
I also like the fact that some of the fields have been updated, particularly the education field, which now gives users a chance to more clearly list which schools they have attended for how long and whether or not they graduated.
Finally, the new look is more like a web page with a header, and I suspect it will replace a lot of occasionally-updated blogs. Nearly every field is customizable (or deletable), and you have total control over who can see it (in a very user-friendly manner).
The "from birth" claim about the page is kind of funny, considering that the minimum age of a Facebook user is supposed to be 13, and Facebook hasn't been around that long. Unless you choose to start uploading all of your childhood photos (or your mother and grandmother discover Facebook and start tagging you in all of their family photos), you really won't have a history that goes back to birth. Your history will normally start when you signed up for Facebook, with a few entries relating to your high school or college days. Considering, however, that people do often post their children's photos on Facebook, it is conceivable that if the site hangs around for another decade or two, someone could literally have their whole lives on Facebook. What an interesting thought. A little frightening, but interesting.
Also interesting is the fact that this new Facebook timeline, which has been in the works for several months, looks A LOT like the new Twitter update, which kind of surprised everyone, and which we covered earlier this week. It's almost as if someone at Twitter might have had a preview of the new Facebook timeline, and wanted to beat them to the punch. Hmm....
Anyway, here's a video to learn more about the timeline. To download it, go HERE. It's also available on mobile (you'll need to manually update your application, or uninstall and reinstall it to get it).
