You may miss out on Facebook posts, and there is little you can do about it
When a company like Facebook believes that it knows better which updates you want to see than you, and does not make it easy to display all posts of friends on Facebook at the same time, then there is something inherently wrong with that system.
Whenever you visit the social networking company Facebook, be it on the web directly or in a mobile app of your choice, you are presented with a selection of top stories only.
Top stories are selected by Facebook automatically in the background based on factors such as popularity. If a story gets comments and others don't, chance is that the story with comments will become a top story.
The problem here is that Facebook does not display the other updates at all on the page. And if you don't know that, or cannot find a way to display updates in chronological order, you may miss out on a lot of posts and updates on the site.
While it is possible to switch to most recent on the Facebook website, it won't stay the default option forever.
I have not found out when the setting gets reverted, deleting cookies or signing out does not seem to trigger it all the time.
To change the display for the session, do the following:
- Open Facebook and log in to your account.
- Click on the small down arrow next to news feed located at the top left of the screen and select most recent instead of top stories.
- Et voila, all updates are now displayed to you, not only those that Facebook's algorithm believes are of greater interest.
What many Facebook users don't know is that there is another option that works all the time. Instead of opening facebook.com, try loading https://www.facebook.com/?sk=h_chr directly.
This loads the news feed in chronological order (aka most recent mode) automatically when you do so.
As mentioned earlier, top stories are displayed on mobile devices as well by default. It is even less obvious on those devices how to switch to most recent stories instead.
On Android, you need to tap on the Hamburger button (the three bars) at the top, scroll all the way down until you find most recent under feeds.
This preference does not stick as well. As is the case on the website it will revert eventually to top stories only. Unlike on the website where you can use the url posted above to display updates in chronological order, it is not possible to do the same when you are using the application.
This has annoyed me a whole lot, so thank you for the url-alternative provided. At least now when I’m in front of my PC I don’t need to go through the News Feed switcharoo anymore :)
One of the most frustrating changes of the past few years on Facebook has always been their “featured stories” newsfeed. And with the new changes to try to hide chronological post views (I’m sure it will be removed entirely within a year or so), it really undermines the usefulness of the platform. I’m almost ready to give up on Facebook for good.
like and share. i know most of you won’t. you know who you are…
Even with ‘most recent’, I’m not sure I trust it short of visiting every friend’s page…
Infuriating. I have better luck when I set up groups (small ones, under about 20 friends, but I’m testing 40 now) and view THOSE group pages, but (#FirstWorldProblems) then I see too much, like the games they played, every picture they took, etc. But at least I won’t miss BIG news (like a birth, death…) and look like a bitch for not seeing something.
I’ve hung a shingle saying I visit irregularly and don’t get regular updates. And if I truly WANT someone to see something, I tag them in the post/comment.
I know FB has to monetize (I guess — I use hosts and ABP so I don’t see their ads), but it’s a shame the service has become SO much worse over time as a way to connect with actual real friends. :/
Hung a shingle? Had to Google that!
It was better before when they allowed us to categorize or edit the types of feeds we get from our friends, now there is only an absolution option, yes or no… which relies on stupid algorithms to figure out which of our friends have relevant information we must see. I wish they would ditch that and go back to the other method. It was their way of fixing the problem sites like games trying to circumvent their ads to all people’s friends feeds as something other than a game.
And just for the record I only have less than 40 FB friends. I actually know or chat with these few all the time. I’m not one of these friend hogs who have 5k friends and don’t know any of them. I want to know the people I friend. I don’t want to see every damn funny cutsey picture or whatever they share. I want to know about them and their daily lives. I don’t want game tokens for games I am not playing and scoring a high point value in some stupid FB game isn’t a life event. There are some really nice people I’ve met through FB and though we’ve chatted and interacts in some way, all I keep getting in my feeds are junk they post or share and not actual life stuff.
Actually, the granularity is more than you suggest… Drop down the arrow at the top left of a message and select (something like) “I don’t want to see this” — you get a confirmation message along the likes of “Hide posts from Martha Stewart Recipes”, followed by a “Why” question if you say “yes, hide it” (you do not have to specify why). This lets you hide all of the [recipes] a friend shares from ‘liked’ Facebook sites without hiding all posts from that person.
There is something inherently wrong with Facebook, period. The sooner it goes away, the better. And, it will go away.
Oh, wrong thread sorry. Heh.
No: FB’s good for friends and stuff. It’s GOT to improve because any new service will just try to monetize, as well. It’s better than Google +NSA.
I’ve missed many of my friends posts because of this and though it’s not a dealbreaker to have to reset the web site or app every time you log in, it’s very annoying. I seem to see more ads and posts for “suggested apps” than anything else. I mean, the whole purpose of using Facebook, at least for me, is to share and keep in touch with friends and family, but that part seems to be going to the wayside.
I’ve also tried different things to see if the posts will stay in chronological order, but nothing has worked. Once in a while, when I log in, it’ll still be in order. Other times it’s not. I also noticed that I see different posts depending on which device I’m viewing Facebook. By this I mean that I’ll see some posts on my iPad, others on my phone, and others on the website. Some posts might show on just one device while others might appear on all devices.
I just wish that they would listen more to what their users like and dislike.
Hmmm…folks at Enenews.com have been complaining about Facebook mischief regarding Enenews posts. Enenews is reporting on the dangers of nuclear energy/nuclear radiation, and this goes against the grain of a very powerful nuclear industry…
And I was wondering why I couldn’t see updates of some of my friends. Facebook has really come up with some annoying changes in past year or so. Thanks for the tip Martin.
The app Facebook Ticker displays just that on Android, but while it works most of the time, sometimes it doesn’t. Still, it suggest that the Ticker can be accessed directly.
Facebook has been really annoying in the recent times implementing many different changes in its algorithm. The pages were the first to get targeted and no one knows what’s in store for the future!
Hello.. Im facing lots of trouble out here saying ur account has been temporarily blocked and asking me to upload my government issued id as my facebook account was (Avi Khez Yakuza) and my middle name or Nik name wasn’t that of my facebook account name and too my school id was… an if I tried to upload my school id it says something went wrong we will fix it soon please help me my account back as I can’t able to unlock it with my school id an with my d.o.b certificate so please im begging who ever was i’ll be so thankful to u sir, miss or Madame…. please im dying to browse my facebook back again….