Facebook Smart Lists: How it works

Image Credit: Facebook

Facebook have been creating lists for users and one of the lists that has started appearing recently is know as 'Smart Lists'. This is an automatic list, meaning Facebook populates this list for you. There are two main reasons why users create and maintain Facebook lists.

1. View updates from only people in that list -- say you have a list know as School Friends, you can always click on this list to see updates from the people on that list. So instead of browsing through your entire news feed for individual updates, you can click on the list and see all the updates from people belonging to that list.

2. Post status updates to only certain friends on Facebook -- so when you want to update only a certain group of friends, you can post a status update and from the drop-down choose only the group or list of people who you want to be seeing this post and replying to it. 

Facebook has taken the liberty to work for you by creating Smart Lists. Automatically populated by the Facebook algorithm, that works for you. Here are a few questions if you're wondering how this whole process happens.

How to activate Facebook Smart Lists
On your news feed you should see the Smart List introduction, also if you go to your other lists on Facebook, you should see the suggestion to create and maintain a smart list. You would need to click 'Okay' to get the list setup.

Who are the friends' that Facebook suggests for this list
Smart lists automatically update themselves with coworkers, classmates, local friends and family members based on your friends' profile info.

How to edit 'Smart Lists'
To do this you will need either go to your lists home by clicking on this link. Also once you're on your news feed you can click on 'More'  found when you hover over the 'Friends' link found on the left-hand sidebar. 

Is Smart List one complete list
No, smart lists are a group of lists that update themselves automatically. So smart lists will come with names like your School name, company name,  local friends - people who stay geographically close to you and family members. So when you see lists like this populating your list page - you now know what is happening. The lists currently are limited to Work, School, Family, City.

Let us know what you think about this new feature in the comments section below. You can also read more at the Facebook Blog.

An original post by

Sociolatte

Add people to acquaintances on Facebook

Facebook has another big idea that has been rolled out and it is called  Acquaintances lists. We have covered it before and specifically addressed the issue of adding people to your restricted lists. Now with the new Acquaintances lists feature Facebook will suggest users to be added to this list. Now you might be wondering what happens when people are added to this list. Once added to this list they will not be notified and they will not be unfriended. This way you get to see fewer updates from them and this will cause you to forget them in a way and not unfriend them. Unfriending is becoming very popular on Facebook and a lot of users have to face the disappointment of being unfriended. This according to Facebook is a much more dignified way or keeping updates from people you are not really familiar with out of your news feed. It will also aim to cutting down on unfriending people.

How to add people to your Acquaintances on Facebook list without letting them find out.

1. Login to Facebook

2. Click on this link to visit your friends page and then click on Acquaintances list 

3. Under list suggestions you can click on 'See All suggestions'

4. A tick mark on anyone would mean you want to add them to the list

5. Once you have finished clicking on all the people you want in the list, Click on 'Add To Acquaintances'

6. You're done.

This feature is now live and you can start using it right-away. Will be useful to see less from certain people.

 

Facebook Interests Lists: How does it work

Facebook has a new feature and it can be found on the left-hand sidebar of your news feed. Clicking on it will allow you to create a list of people, pages and friends you would like to follow as a separate list. Now this new feature works in a similar fashion to 'Lists' found on Twitter. On Twitter if you want to follow a specific group of people you can group them into a list. Once you click on that list you get all the Tweets from only these specific people. Thereby reducing Twitter noise and first reading only Tweets from these people. These are your favorite people on Twitter. Facebook Interests will function in a similar fashion. You create a list of people you would like to follow. You have three main categories to choose from - 1. Subscriptions 2. Pages 3. Friends.


How to create a list on Facebook Interests
1. Login to Facebook
2. Click on the Facebook icon to go to your news feed
3. Go all the way down till you see 'Interests'
4. Hover over interests and click on 'more'
5. Click on create a list to start creating
6. Choose from Pages, subscriptions and friends
7. Tick on the people you want to add to your list and they get added
8. Name your list
9. Set the privacy options - either public, only friends or only you
10. Click 'Done' and you're done.


Note: You can also use the search box to add people to your list. So if you have not yet subscribed to anyone as yet on Facebook. You can do so from the search box and add people to your Interests Lists. Please check the video below for a more detailed look into create Facebook Interests. You can also share your Interests with your pals once your done. They can then subscribe to that list. 

An original post by

Sociolatte