Facebook Notes gets a cosmetic makeover
Did you know that Facebook Notes aren’t buried six feet under? Remember those ugly old “Notes” which were used for when someone didn’t have enough characters in a status update to complain about the mall pretzel salesperson that was rude?
As seen above, they’re about to get a makeover, as discovered by developer Dave Winer (click here to see his Note).
It’s no secret that Facebook wants to be The Internet (your social network, your professional network, your store front, your email, your brain), so this appears to be another attempt to grab eyeballs and serve yet another function as they seek to be the Swiss Army knife of the web (the title of which most would agree currently goes to Google).
Borrowing some ideas from a competitor
What bothers us about the makeover is that it looks just like Medium whose formula (huge image + large serif fonts + round profile picture) forever changed website design and now Facebook’s design with some very blatant design “borrowing.”
Facebook told The Verge, “We’re testing an update to Notes to make it easier for people to create and read longer-form stories on Facebook.”
In other words, “please don’t blog on Medium, blog here, remember blogs?”
It makes sense for Facebook
When Facebook increased the character limit on statuses, Notes died, but it appears they’ll be reborn in a different form that doesn’t rely on users’ understanding of Notes or the fact that they ever existed. Further, we suspect that they’ll be rebranded and called something clever like “Longbooking” or “Faceblogging.”
It makes sense for Facebook, as they’ve tested news integration, and it’s yet another “please don’t go to any other site or use any other app besides Facebook” play. And they have a shot at it, because unlike Medium, everyone’s already on Facebook.
The test appears to be limited to a select few, and it is unknown when or how they will roll out this new option, but we believe it will be soon.
