Facebook makes News Feed ‘more personal’ with ranking algorithm changes
The social network is using survey data to identify your favorite people and will rank their posts higher on your News Feed.
- I've been covering technology and mobile for 12 years, first as a telecommunications reporter and assistant editor at ZDNet in Australia, then as CNET's West Coast head of breaking news, and now in the Thought Leadership team.
Facebook has updated its prediction algorithm.
Facebook has added data from surveys to better predict what pages users want at the top of their News Feed.
Posts from family and friends, and news articles or videos from pages followed, will now be ranked at the very top of the page, Facebook said Thursday.
The changes focus on quality of user experience over quantity of time spent on the social network, Facebook said.
Surveys were used in the algorithm change, with users asked to rank the friends they are closest to, Facebook said in a blog post.
The survey data is being used in addition to Facebook's oversight of people's likes, comments, and shares, as well as how often they interact with friends, who they have marked as close friends and how many mutual friends two users have.
Facebook's prediction algorithm also looks at friends who are tagged in the same photos, friends who react to or comment on the same posts, and friends who check in at the same places.
The prediction model will continuously update, Facebook said, to keep up with any changes to favorite people or pages.