UNC Healthy Heels

A:  I don’t like either.

Yesterday I logged into Facebook and I was not pleased. Want to know why? Suddenly, my Facebook had switched to timeline! I did not want this. I joined Facebook in 2005, back when you had to have an .edu email to join, there was no such thing as an app, and there wasn’t even such a thing as an album. As time has passed, I’ve tried to be open to the changes.  Facebook albums—okay cool.  News feed—eh I can deal. A million different app requests to ignore—slightly irritated. Timeline—this may be the last straw.

Why am I so opposed to the timeline? Well one trivial reason, I find it visually unpleasant. It’s busy and hard to read and I miss the basic simplicity of the wall. But, on a more meaningful level, it brings up a whole slew of privacy issues. To avoid sounding like a broken record I won’t go into detail here about why it’s important to keep your Facebook in check, but if you’re interested in reading more about employers and Facebook check out this article.

Back to timeline. Basically timeline highlights important stories, thus allowing you and others checking out your profile to (easily) journey back through time. However, these important stories are up to Facebook, and maybe Facebook decides to highlight that really inappropriate link that your old roommate posted on your wall. The one you never thought of again because it was buried all the way back in 2009. But now you would die of your professor/mother/potential employer/ peers saw it?

At least one thing I can say for timeline (and I think this is probably the only thing I can say), is they do give you a 7 day “preview period,” before your timeline is automatically published. What this means is you have 7 days to go through, look at all of your stories and make sure Facebook didn’t unearth a little bit of the past that was better left buried.

So what should you do? During the 7 day preview period, go through your timeline. Make sure that there are no “better-left-buried” stories. If there are, you can delete or hide them, and according to Facebook they should be effectively hidden from public view (until the next changes at least).

This can be a daunting process, however; there is help! This video from the Business Insider walks you through the first steps of tackling your timeline, starting with checking out who can even see your timeline. Check it out!

So now that I’ve blogged about it, I’m off to hide stories from my timeline…

A few other articles that might be of interest:

• Top 3 Mistakes Job Seekers Make on Facebook Timeline (mashable.com)
• Facebook’s Timeline Soon Will Be Mandatory (informationweek.com)
• How To Change The Cover Photo In Your Facebook Timeline (businessinsider.com)
• #Facebook Timeline Is Coming 2/29, Get Over It AND Upgrade Already. SERIOUSLY (anisesmithmarketing.com)
• Like it or Not Your Getting Facebook Timeline (insydetech.info)