Facebook Introduces Twitter Like Tagging : A Wannabe Move?
For me, Twitter has always been the first priority over Facebook and FriendFeed because I find it so much easier to manage and find the content I need presto. Agreed, FB gives me richer media while FF syndicates dozens of my other social media services; but in the end it becomes an endless stream of ‘I-do-not-always-want’ stuff.
And one of the strongest features behind Twitter is the @reply option, where you can address a person (tag him) by adding @ before his Twitter name. But Facebook doesn’t have any easy way to address someone in a public conversation, to include someone into the talk. It’s about to change now, as Facebook has started rolling out the tag feature in wall posts! And you can even address a Facebook Fan Page or Group to make the link, using the universal symbol @ for replies now.
How’s it gonna happen? If you wanna address someone on Facebook you type the symbol @ and a drop down menu comes from where you can select the chosen friend, group, event, selection or pages. The friends will get a notification and hopefully come back to the content to see why someone is talking about him / her.
One of the most popular features of Facebook has been the name tagging on photos, and it looks as if Facebook is going to one up this by emulating another cooler thing from Twitter. Well, it’s never a bad thing to copy a good idea. And they have done it better than Twitter! In Twitter you have to memorize your friend’s name to add @ before his name, or use a third party app on desktop; which a new user will never do!
The Flipside -
It’s always good to think of the bad case scenarios too. While this might be a good way to gather random conversations about the same thing together, it can get really cumbersome for popular people. People use Facebook for much more personal reasons than Twitter, and if someone like, say Gul Panag gets a new ping every time because someone is addressing her, she will be doing that all day.
All in all, I am super excited to see this feature. Why? Because this is strictly Twitter territory! And Facebook has just stepped all over it, with fanfare. Let’s see what Twitter comes up with.
P.S. – Guys over at Twitter, you must innovate and keep rolling out new features. You want to be the pulse of the planet? Then you must get new users to stick; keeping power users hooked on.
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