The outcry at Facebook “imposing” its new design on usershas surprised me. After all I thought people using the system might be pleased to see improvements. It would seem however that the usual fear of change you see in the general populous is pretty virulent in the Facebook community too. There are Facebook groups against the new layout and even online petitions.

Lets assume this is just a visual redesign - I’d still take Facebook’s side it’s their website to do as they wish. Why should they keep the overhead of running two designs that can mean maintenance and upgrades are more difficult?

But deep down the new layout isn’t just about visual appeal (although I much prefer the cleaner look) it’s all about usability and they’ve done a good job. Everything is still easy to be found but the tabbed interface stops everything growing out of control.

Applications and application spam for me and many others has been the bane of Facebook but they’ve handled it well. I can block applications permanently and even all application requests from certain people who I know are a bit free and easy will adding anything and everything to their profile (and sending it to all their friends at the same time) - you know who you are!

Now the new interface means the applications are moved to a separate tab so I no longer need to go onto friends pages and wait for the hundreds of applications to load or scroll for approximately 900 miles down the page to find their wall!

So what are the downsides of the new design? Oh yeah you might have to spend 5 minutes looking around to find where everything is. Five minutes is an exaggeration to be honest as everything is in a very logical position.

If these people got their way we’d still be living in caves.

Wait for a bus and then two come along at once? Well same thing today but with social media websites.

Firstly Smarta.com is billing itself as a information resource for business. Essentially providing social support for your business or future business projects. With the official launch in November 2008 you can check out the blog and register for updates as they come. I’m going to keep an eye on this one as it seems to be backed by some big names like Vodafone and various UK Government agencies.

The next one is called GetCloser.com which is social media site built on your music and film tastes. It’s produced by HMV and isn’t getting the best of press. I’ve had a discussion with Scott Boyd at Fused Nation and he’s got some valid points about how this service is basically a cynical customer profiling system. While I agree about HMV’s motivation for this website I have to say I actually think it’s a very clever way of getting excellent quality data from your customers - you’ve got to respect that.

Are people willing to trade a window into their World for a few nice features on a website? On the whole the answer is yes - people are far too free and easy with their information in my opinion. The law can cover data protection but if people want to hand their personal information over to every Tom, Dick and Harry then they should learn not to be so naive. In the same way that regulation of social networks for children should take the lead from parents protection of your data should start at home.

However other aspects of GetCloser’s marketing of this site are darn right stupid with their marketing agency spamming forums with beta test invitations. Yeah I’ll sign up! Not!

So the Wispa is going back into production thanks to campaigns on various social media sites such as Facebook and MySpace.

The really big question for me is how did Cadbury’s come to the conclusion to discontinue the Wispa in the first place? Everyone I know loves them!

Some people think applications in Facebook are great - I’m of the opinion that in the majority of cases they are a complete waste of my time. I welcomed the opportunity to block a particular application forever with open arms - no more do I have Funwall requests 50 times a day!

Since then it’s now even possible to block application requests from a particular friend - it’s always the same people. You know who you are!

However there are some useful applications out there and I do wonder if I’m sometimes missing out. This leads me to occasionally accept a request just to see what the application does. Quite a lot of the time it seems for an application to work I’ve got invite all my friends to use the application first. So application spam on Facebook has become very common.

Of course this is just application developers being inpatient about spreading their applications - good apps will always float to the top it just takes time so stop using spammy techniques!

However Facebook are now to provide a ranking system for applications - basically marking good apps as “Great apps”. Excellent saves my time - I won’t be trying anything out without this seal of approval from now on.

This also covers various other issues such as the use of personal details so hopefully this will roll out as quickly as possible - developers can have their applications vetted from September.