Facebook Update: Added Icons and Shortcuts

Facebook has added a few new features that seem to be intended to keep us more involved with Facebook and the app!

I got my update the other day and didn’t look at it for a few days, partly from apathy (I mean what else are they going to do it the app?) and partly from the real life messing with my app reviewing, but I finally opened it and here it is. Firstly, the update seems to bring the Android and iPhone app closer together. Not sure if the similarities are just laziness on FB’s part or Apple’s new CEO not sharing the same hatred for Android as his predecessor once did, but they are very alike. Could this be a signal of future shared apps? What’s next, world peace?  But I’m getting ahead of myself.

Regardless, the new update offers some icons that are basically shortcuts for the camera and messenger. Some people seem bothered by the addition of the new apps/icons, but it’s just making it easier to get to the feature we want. Now users can access the camera and messages in the Facebook app or if they are closer to the shortcuts, they can go to them from there. I wasn’t totally pleased to find out they put another messenger icon in, as I have already downloaded the Messenger app separately from the Play Store, but it’s easily removed.

The camera icon seems pretty nice. With the recent rave over Instagram, Facebook seems to be pandering to that fad. It loads pretty swiftly and flows nice. After you take the photo, its right into tagging, witty status updates and location, then boom. You’re done. If you’re someone who is always uploading pictures to Facebook, this is for you.

The only bummer seems to be that if you do not like these new features and decide to uninstall one, you are uninstalling Facebook as a whole. If you are familiar with Facebook in any way and have accepted them as they are, then you are already used to these sorts of rules. As a whole, I like the changes, it seems to keep getting easier for users. Some people don’t and that’s cool too.  Just allows them to have more to talk about too. What it comes down to is that everyone uses Facebook; some people complain while doing it, but I prefer to just embrace and enjoy the technology as it comes.