Facebook has been working on its trending topics for quite sometime now, first by removing the human factor out of the topics selection and then by further sanitising the descriptions of each topic.
These changed were deemed as necessary, especially after users and organisations started questioning the process by which trending topics were selected, ranked and described. While the updates which were rolled out during last year were merely patches to the system, it looks like this time Facebook took a radical step to improve the use and functionality of trending topics both function wise, as well as aesthetically.
The update comes from Ali Ahmadi, Product Manager, and John Angelo, Product Designer, who updated the official blog with details on the updates that have already been live for some users since Wednesday. So far, when users clicked on a trending topic item, they would be redirected to page with a collection of news sources and updates from friends around the matter.
With the new trending topics section, when you click on a Trending topic, you’ll see a carousel with stories from other publications about a given topic that you can swipe through. The stories that appear in the carousel are the most popular ones and they are determined by a number of factors, such as engagement, inbound links and so on.
Apart from the look and feel, Facebook is also changing the location in which trending topics on mobile appear. Until now, you could access the most talk-about news and topics of the day, through the search section. Facebook is now testing a new placement, on the very top of the mobile News Feed.
You’ll be able to see the new results page on iPhone in the US, while Facebook is working on making it available on Android and desktop soon.
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