The New Facebook (again)

So, I’m sure most of you have seen the huge changes with Facebook profiles. User statuses (“What am I doing”) took a major backseat in lieu of brief personal intros pieced together by the data you give Facebook. It’s like they changed the entire MO of the site. Instead of the recent status update being big and beautiful at the top of each users’ profile, it’s now and overview of who you are. One thing I’ve always been impressed with is how well Facebook takes the user into account. This was a bold move mainly because it’s different (and people really don’t like change), but not really so bold when it comes to what Facebook is all about – networking and getting to know and meet people.

Before Twitter, Facebook was kind of going in this direction. Then Twitter came out and Facebook took the whole status update thing and ran with it because it was popular. It’s nice to see Facebook getting back on track though. However…

I do feel it’s a bit cluttered. There are pictures everywhere which annoys me. There’s no longer a single attention-grabbing thing to see when I first view a profile. Instead, there’s a main profile picture, a row of pictures under the intro, a column of pictures of friends on the left, and a few pictures in a column on the right for “People you may know”. Then the ads, if you don’t have them blocked. I like the thought and direction, but it’s just way too busy now and the stuff about me almost becomes secondary, at least visually.

How do you guys feel about it? Do you feel that having a brief overview of who you are at the very top is more important than your latest status update?