Why the new Facebook Homepage stinks

Did I miss something? What am I doing wrong?

This past weekend, I was part of the rollout of the new Facebook home page. I must say what I've seen so far is pretty poor. Facebook has a blog post about the new features, but it basically ignores the downside issues that seem to dominate interaction with the platform.

Here are some of my gripes (they may seem petty, but here we go):

Where did all my friends go?  Most of the folks I find interesting have suddenly disappeared. And I've noticed a dramatic downturn in the volume of posts and responses to my own content. I think it is because they can't find me as much as I can't find their stuff.  Way to Go Facebook!

Not so "newsfeed". Facebook has done a poor job of instructing users how to beef up the "news feed".  I was poking around the site tonight and stumbled upon the "edit options" link at the bottom of the news feed. If you go into this, you'll find that the feed settings "automatically" choose who you may want to interact with on the newsfeed. All those folks content you were seeing before you got the new home page? Probably gone. Play around with the manual settings to see if you can regain access to your friends content.

Sounds vain, but where did I go? Before the "upgrade" to the home page, I knew my content was viewable because when I posted, I would see it on my news feed. The past several days I have encountered several instances where content I posted does not show up. This sounds self-centered, but if I can't see it, can others? Given the drop in volume of  interaction with my content, I'd say no. I think this all goes back to my point above about manually adjusting the newsfeed settings.

Facebook says that it's been testing the new home page, but the way they've marketed this puppy, it feels like they are intentionally avoiding the issues described above.

I understand making changes to improve the experience. I actually like some of the new features. But it feels like going on a treasure hunt to figure out how to get back to normal after the change curve hits you. That, my friends, isn't a well thought out game plan (in my opinion).

If you figure out some answers, let me know. I'll do the same. Meanwhile, Twitter keeps looking better and better.