Facebook is rolling out new ways to customize what you see in your feed • TechCrunch

Facebook is rolling out new ways for users to customize their feed, the social network announced on Wednesday. Beginning today, you will start to see new “Show more” or “Show less” buttons on posts from the people and communities that you’re connected to or on posts that are recommended to you. Facebook is also going to start testing the the new feature with Reels.

The company says that if you select the “Show more” option, it will temporarily increase the ranking score for that post and similar ones. If you select the “Show less” option, you will temporarily decrease its ranking score. A spokesperson from Facebook told TechCrunch that the selections you make influence the posts you see for 60 days. The company says it chose this timeframe because its research showed that people want these preferences to last for at least a few weeks, and also because Facebook wants to keep up with peoples’ changing preferences.

Currently, Facebook only lets you hide posts from people you follow or those it suggests. Now, the company is rolling out tools for posts from your friends and recommended posts.

Facebook will periodically show the “Show less” and “Show more” options to users. Soon, users will be able to access the buttons at any time by tapping into the three-dot menu in the upper-right hand corner. The social network says that by giving users a new way to provide direct feedback about ranking, it will be able to make its AI systems smarter and more responsive.

Image Credits: Meta

Facebook also announced today that it’s testing new settings to allow users to customize how much content they see in their feed from the friends and family, Groups, Pages and public figures they’re connected to. The new settings will allow users to select which posts they want to see more or less. For instance, you can choose to see a “normal” amount of posts from your friends and family, while choosing to see “less” posts from the pages and public figures you follow.

“Features like these can help you discover more of the content that’s valuable to you, so you can see more of what you want and less of what you don’t,” the company said in a blog post. “As with every product change we make, we’ll use direct feedback to continually refine our approach.”

With the changes announced today, it’s possible that Facebook is looking to address complaints from users who say their feed is filled with too many posts that they’re not actually interested in. The new user controls should help address these issues by giving users more control over the content that appears in their feeds.

It’s also worth noting that Facebook likely wants to better train its algorithm to learn what posts and Reels people actually want to see, especially as its parent company Meta competes with TikTok, which is notorious for its game changing algorithm. Considering that Facebook will test the new controls with Reels, Facebook likely is looking for ways to get more people engaged with its short-form video product.