Facebook Facelift...Failing?

On Monday, Valleywag reported that 80 percent of Facebook’s users have not moved over to the “new” Facebook, much to the great chagrin of Mark Zuckerberg. I am an old school user (my university was one of the first schools that Facebook targeted at launch) and have not migrated…mainly because I thoroughly like the old Facebook, and don’t see much of change in the redesign from a functionality standpoint.

That being said, I find the spin Facebook’s PR team is putting the redesign slightly disheartening, stating that 20 percent of their users have migrated. Great, but how do you hide the fact that 80 percent are content to stay with the old Facebook? This is one of those examples where numbers do not help public relations teams get their job done. Usually, data points make our jobs easier: ROI, ease-of-use, analyst statistics, the list goes on. But showing that an overwhelming majority of your audience refuses to try out your latest-and-greatest product…that’s the kind of number you want to downplay.

I’m not saying that Facebook’s redesign is going to fail. Far from it. I just think that they will end up forcing users onto it…that happened to me recently, when I installed the Tiny Adventures application (which I highly recommend). I was immediately bounced to the new Facebook…so I guess I had better get used to it.

-John Terrill