At first, you could only post things on Facebook. People could read them but it wasn’t a dialogue. Then came comments and people could respond to what you had to say. Everything got chattier. Next came the Like button, an innovation that has caught on not just on Facebook but all around the whole dang InterWeb.
Facebook has now started rolling out a Save button that you’ll soon see alongside Like and Comment under a friend’s status update. Then you can go back and read the stuff you’ve Saved later on. Whatever you Save is allegedly kept private so other people won’t know what’s in your special folder. Still, this is Facebook we’re talking about, Kings of Oversharing, so I would be a little apprehensive about saving every mundane update from that long-ago ex if I were you.
This is being played out as a big threat to services like Instapaper that let you save interesting things to read later or refer back to. I’m dubious of that. What does Facebook need to worry about Instapaper for? But it does seem designed to make Facebook a stickier place, a place to return to, to use as a homepage where all your special things are. Facebook has likely seen the flatlines of new members and the occasional dip in numbers of people visiting the site regularly.
That being said, I think this is cool. Lots of times my friends post cool articles that I don’t have time to read and so I’ll likely use this, despite sneaky profit motives by Facebook. And thus always with Facebook, my hatefriend, my alienating companion.
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