New! There is an excitement about it, yes? The word has such positive associations – like fresh, further, different – but also unfamiliar and strange. And therein lies the rub: “New” isn’t always better, and it often requires us to get past the dread and procrastinator in all of us.
This is why I am usually not at the forefront of technology updates, including adopting Facebook’s Timeline. In order to appreciate the fresh, I have to get past the unfamiliar. Apparently I am not alone, as 75 percent of my friends have not adopted it yet, either. But it’s coming. We’ll all be flipped very soon. Will you spend that first day whining that you want the old Facebook back, or perhaps, be not afraid?
You’ve probably stumbled across a friend’s Timeline and said “Whaaaa?” I must admit my first reaction was not “Cool!” but “Where am I supposed to look first?” Then I proceeded to mentally leap to all the reasons why I am justified in feeling there is no need for new: “There’s nothing wrong with my current profile. Why fix what isn’t broken?” But is that true? How many of you filled out your profile once and never went back to it?
As one of the first public statements about yourself in social media, who felt profile pressure to be worldly, sophisticated and cool based on taste in books and entertainment? Books: Better make sure they’re bestsellers or literary classics. Music: Go mainstream high school, alternative college or something current? Movies: English accents and obscure indie’s are Academy faves! Can’t go wrong there, but what does that say about me really? When I created an account in 2008, I would never have posted that my recent theatre outing was more likely to be Journey 2 than The Artist. I really don’t mind totally over-the-top, escapist fare if my son thinks I am the coolest for taking him. With my privacy set to share with only people I choose, why wouldn’t I post more water cooler-worthy topics?
So I took the plunge with Timeline and realized how easy it is. The fields populate with choices after a few letters, not only adding colorful graphics to my page, but linking those pages to my feed. Classic as Jane Eyre is, I am much more likely to connect with my friends on The Hunger Games, a great trilogy and now a highly anticipated movie. What do American Horror Show, Modern Family and Pretty Little Liars have in common? Me! And now in my feed I get reminders of new episodes and casting updates. Want to invite me to a game of “Words with Friends” because you see I liked it? Beware! I am currently sharing a Kindle with a husband who manages to earn 60 points on a word like “jest.”
Timeline showcases more than entertainment likes. Type “Cape Cod” in maps for places you have been and find not only specific towns but also restaurants and stores. For example, I can add Captain Parkers, where we had the best chowdah. Did a relative just post an old pic of you? Now you can tie a year to it to explain those really bad perms (and file it waaay back). Yes, for a fully updated page, there is some backtracking involved. My page defaults to me having married in 2008, a tad awkward since I have a teenage daughter, but easy enough to edit.
The bottom line? I get it now. Timeline enhances the overall experience for me. It creates a scrapbook of the community I have created, logging when I liked or friended someone, posted pics, updated my status, etc., but it also improves the reach of those communities by facilitating connections to the things that matter to me. We haven’t stayed the same since we started our pages — why should our profiles?
Of course, it’s not like Facebook doesn’t deserve some of our angst. It’s never been particularly good at selling in the updates, but it has learned a few things. As a start, if you search “Timeline” within Facebook, there is an instructional page with plenty of FAQ’s. Facebook is going to roll out Timeline for brands, as well. Watch how marketers get a move on and join us in embracing the “new.”
What do you think of Timeline?