Skip to main content

Facebook changes ‘Hide All’ to ‘Unfollow,’ shaming us for ignoring annoying friends

facebook unfollow button
Image used with permission by copyright holder

There are always going to be those Facebook posts we don’t want to see; the Nth baby photo, the Instagram-pushed food porn, the vaguebook status updates. The people behind them, however, we don’t want to go whole hog and defriend … just be able to black bar their occasionally aggravating posts.

To this end, Facebook introduced “Hide All,” an option that appeared via drop down menu that let you get rid of a user’s obnoxious updates without getting rid of them. There were other options, too, like requesting Facebook only show you important posts from these people (engagements, new jobs, new homes, etc).

Recommended Videos

Now, Facebook has made a minor change, but one that might feel significant: Instead of the “Hide All” option, you now can only “Unfollow” your friends. You could also opt to say you just don’t like a specific post, and why, or get all notifications for a post – but the big change here is the “Unfollow.”

Unfollow doesn’t mean you’re defriending this person. Instead, you’re just not going to get anymore updates from them. No one knows you’ve unfollowed them, but it is a cut and dry way to silence someone entirely, and the language change from “Hide All” to “Unfollow” seems to be making users feel … well, a little mean about censoring their annoying Facebook friends.

“We are making a small update to the options people have to customize News Feed. Previously, people could hide all updates from a particular friend or Page if they didn’t want to see any more posts from them,” a Facebook spokesperson tells me. “For example, you could hide updates from a person by selecting ‘Hide all from Jane Smith.’ Going forward, this will work in the same way but the language will change to ‘Unfollow Jane Smith.’ This means you are still friends, but updates from that person won’t appear in your News Feed. The goal of this change is to help people curate their News Feed and see more of the content that they care about.”

Of course, some of those previously mentioned options for seeing a certain amount of someone in your News Feed are now gone – but if you take the time the put them in Facebook’s pre-made lists, then you’ll accomplish (probably) whatever it was Facebook was doing for you anyway. If you only want to see the important things from someone, throw them into your Acquaintances list, and it could solve the trick. Or create your own list of “people I only sometimes want to see updates from,” and then the problem is certainly solved. 

But I get it: We’re lazy, we’ve been coddled, and the News Feed frustration is never-ending. Losing options always hurts. 

Facebook’s White Whale is the News Feed, and whatever curation tips it can glean from users, it will glean. As it grows larger – and that means its user base, ad sales, ad placements, promoted posts, sponsored stories, and updated posted all increase – the platform needs all the help it can get weeding through the noise to find them gems for each individual user. No two News Feeds should be the same, and because the amount of information flowing in is so high, Facebook has to look to us for help dissecting it. This is just one more way the social network can pick and choose what goes in our News Feed; if we Unfollow someone, it’s one less signal to have to measure.

Topics
Molly McHugh
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Before coming to Digital Trends, Molly worked as a freelance writer, occasional photographer, and general technical lackey…
Facebook cancels all large, in-person events through June 2021
mark zuckerberg speaking in front of giant digital lock

Facebook will be canceling its large events through June 2021 in response to the ongoing outbreak of coronavirus, officially known as COVID-19, according to CEO and founder Mark Zuckerberg.

Some events will take place in virtual form, though Zuckerberg did not share any details.

Read more
Facebook hires Reuters to fact-check posts, but politicians can still lie in ads
facebook-under-a-magnifying-glass

Facebook is trying to fight fake news and misinformation on its platform by hiring Reuters to fact-check, but it’s still not verifying political ads.  

The new fact-checking unit at Reuters, which launched on Wednesday, will look at the content posted on Facebook and Instagram and identify when it is fake or misleading. A Reuter’s spokesperson told Digital Trends that the types of posts would include photos, videos, and headlines. Ads are noticeably missing from that list of fact-checked content. 

Read more
Facebook teaches us all how web privacy works with Messenger Kids
facebook messenger kids privacy education how your info is used 1

Facebook -- the network that paid a $5 billion fine over privacy violations last summer -- wants to help teach kids about the lack of privacy on the internet. In a slew of new features to Messenger Kids, Facebook is launching a tool that uses simple, kid-friendly language to detail how user information is used. While Facebook is hardly a role model on user data, the rundown on data use is, frankly, something some adults could use, too.

Facebook says the in-app tool aims to inform kids on what types of information others can see about them -- which is more restricted in Messenger Kids than any other Facebook-owned app. The in-app tool reminds kids that names and photos are visible to other people, parents can see messages, messages can’t be deleted, and Facebook saves user information.

Read more