Facebook Lite makes a return as a mobile application
Remember Facebook Lite? Facebook experimented with a low-resource version of the website back in 2009 and discontinued the site a year later in 2010 citing that Facebook Lite was not optimized for mobile devices and that apps should be used instead.
The company did release and remove several apps in the meantime for mobile users and while those worked fine on most devices, they were not optimized for low-resource devices.
The release of Facebook Lite a couple of days ago for Google Android changes that. The apk file has a size of less than 300 Kilobyte and will install on all devices fast because of this (the regular Facebook app has a size of more than 30 Megabyte)
It has been designed for low-resource devices that connect to the Internet via 2G networks or in locations where network connectivity is limited.
Facebook restricts access to the application on Google Play to select countries in Asia and Africa. If you try to install it from another location, most of Europe or North-America for instance, you will get the notification that the app is incompatible with your device.
It is however possible to download the application from third-party sources and install it directly on your Android device.
As far as functionality is concerned, it seems to support the majority of features that the main Facebook app supports.
When you start it you are taken to your news feed by default which lists the most recent posts and events like birthdays as well.
The top features a search and below that information about friend requests, unread messages and notifications.
Additional pages are displayed when you click on the Hamburger menu icon. There it is possible to access photos, settings, pages, groups or events.
The bottom displays options to post a status update, or take or upload photos to Facebook.
Layout and design are optimized for fast loading times. This means that you don't get as much eye candy but will notice that contents load and display faster because of it.
It is not clear yet if you will save battery when using the app compared to the regular Facebook app. It is likely that Facebook Lite will use less battery than the regular app and that it will improve performance as well and especially so on low to mid devices.
The app has not been released for Apple's iOS and it is unlikely that it will be released for the operating system.
Verdict
Facebook Lite for Android offers an interesting option to mobile users who notice performance issues when they use the regular Facebook application on their device. I would be very surprised if it would not improve battery and performance on many devices. (via Techcrunch)
Martin, I would appreciate that you do not censor this post, as it’s informative writing.
Onur, there is a misleading statement “[…] GIFs are animated images …”. No, obviously you don’t seem to have take much notice of what you were told back in March regarding; Graphics Interchange Format (GIF).
For example, https://www.ghacks.net/2023/03/31/whats-gif-explanation-and-how-to-use-it/#comment-4562919 (if you had read my replies within that thread, you might have learnt something useful). I even mentioned, “GIF intrinsically supports animated images (GIF89a)”.
You linked to said article, [Related: …] within this article, but have somehow failed to take onboard what support you were given by several more knowledgeable people.
If you used AI to help write this article, it has failed miserably.
AI is stupid, and it will not get any better if we really know how this all works. Prove me wrong.. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4IYl1sTIOHI
Martin, [#comment-4569908] is only meant to be in: [https://www.ghacks.net/2023/07/09/how-to-send-gifs-on-iphone-two-different-ways/]. Whereas it appears duplicated in several recent random low-quality non relevant articles.
Obviously it [#comment-4569908] was posted: 9 July 2023. Long before this thread even existed… your database is falling over. Those comments are supposed to have unique ID values. It shouldn’t be possible to duplicate the post ID, if the database had referential integrity.
Don’t tell me!
Ghacks wants the state to step in for STATE-MANDATED associations to save jobs!!!
Bring in the dictatorship!!!
And screw Rreedom of Association – too radical for Ghacks maybe
GateKeeper ?
That’s called “appointing” businesses to do the state’s dirty work!!!!!
But the article says itself that those appointed were not happy – implying they had not choice!!!!!!
@The Dark Lady,
@KeZa,
@Database failure,
@Howard Pearce,
@Howard Allan Pearce,
Note: I replaced the quoted URI scheme: https:// with “>>” and posted.
The current ghacks.net is owned by “Softonic International S.A.” (sold by Martin in October 2019), and due to the fate of M&A, ghacks.net has changed in quality.
>> ghacks.net/2023/09/02/microsoft-is-removing-wordpad-from-windows/#comment-4573130
Many Authors of bloggers and advertisers certified by Softonic have joined the site, and the site is full of articles aimed at advertising and clickbait.
>> ghacks.net/2023/08/31/in-windows-11-the-line-between-legitimate-and-adware-becomes-increasingly-blurred/#comment-4573117
As it stands, except for articles by Martin Brinkmann, Mike Turcotte, and Ashwin, they are low quality, unhelpful, and even vicious. It is better not to read those articles.
How to display only articles by a specific author:
Added line to My filters in uBlock Origin: ghacks.net##.hentry,.home-posts,.home-category-post:not(:has-text(/Martin Brinkmann|Mike Turcotte|Ashwin/))
>> ghacks.net/2023/09/01/windows-11-development-overview-of-the-august-2023-changes/#comment-4573033
By the way, if you use an RSS reader, you can track exactly where your comments are (I’m an iPad user, so I use “Feedly Classic”, but for Windows I prefer the desktop app “RSS Guard”).
RSS Guard: Feed reader which supports RSS/ATOM/JSON and many web-based feed services.
>> github.com/martinrotter/rssguard#readme
We all live in digital surveillance glass houses under scrutiny of evil people because of people like Musk. It’s only fair that he takes his turn.
“Operating systems will be required to let the user choose the browser, virtual assistant and search engine of their choice. Microsoft cannot force users to use Bing or Edge. Apple will have to open up its iOS operating system to allow third-party app stores, aka allow sideloading of apps. Google, on the other hand, will need to provide users with the ability to uninstall preloaded apps (bloatware) from Android devices. Online services will need to allow users to unsubscribe from their platform easily. Gatekeepers need to provide interoperability with third-parties that offer similar services.”
Wonderful ! Let’s hope they’ll comply with that law more than they are doing with the GDPR.