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Facebook: Filter your News Feed even more

Social-network members still can't chuck the updates into their RSS reader, but they can now filter the items based on events, groups, and applications.

Caroline McCarthy Former Staff writer, CNET News
Caroline McCarthy, a CNET News staff writer, is a downtown Manhattanite happily addicted to social-media tools and restaurant blogs. Her pre-CNET resume includes interning at an IT security firm and brewing cappuccinos.
Caroline McCarthy

You can now filter the items in your Facebook News Feed depending on what you're hoping to check out, thanks to a cool new drop-down menu. Previously, you could sort the list by a few Facebook mainstays: status updates, photo-related updates, and "posted items."

The filter additions, originally reported late last night by TechCrunch, are events, groups, fan pages, several applications that differ by the member (my filter offers me the option to search by the "Bumper Sticker" application, which I have never installed but which I guess a fair number of people on my friends list have) and the custom friends lists that Facebook started letting members create last year.

That's useful. If you've gone to the trouble to create a custom friend grouping for your family members, for example, you can now filter your News Feed to keep tabs on what they're up to. I don't think I'll be filtering by Bumper Sticker updates anytime soon, but sorting to keep tabs on my high-school classmates would certainly be worthwhile. And totally not creepy at all.