The new feed on facebook is rather difficult to swallow.

Firstly, it takes away plausible deniability. Feeds are more appropriate for news and similar non-personal sites (including topical blogs). However, for personal data, websites must designed in such a way to consider people’s privacy. I can’t claim that you did not see it. I can’t claim that I had changed it a month ago. Every time I change my profile, every time I update photos, everyone will see it. Unfortunately, not all friends are created equal.

Secondly, the design tears away the mindless browsing. I personally like shopping in a b&m grocery store rather than an online store, because I like to touch and feel. Here, I am encouraged not to browse. But at least, it doesn’t track which profiles I read…or does it?

And besides, I noticed today a friend finally changed single to in relationship today almost a few months after his girlfriend moved into his apartment. I guess this goes to show, what we do online probably isn’t a reflection of our real life. So does this new design count as stalking?

So now, when is it the appropriate time to change the relationship status to “in a relationship”? When is it appropriate to change to “single” or “it’s complicated”. Do people nowadays ever say “HEY LET’S GO STEADY?”

The most I ever did was as I was pointing my finger in the air, “Are we boyfriend-girlfriend now?”