Inside Facebook is reporting today that Facebook is set to launch three new features in Q1 of 2008. These features include:
- Friend list privacy controls
- Facebook in new languages
- Blasting messages to groups with more than 1,000 members
Friend list privacy control is a no-brainer. If you separate your friends into work and personal lists, you want to be able to control what each group sees. It's just a logical step for Facebook and a feature that probably should have been implemented before the launch of Friends lists.
Again, translating Facebook into new languages makes a huge amount of sense as well. Facebook is getting bigger and bigger in the international market and one of the things that's stopping them from bumping off more localized social networks is the language barrier. Maybe this will push them over the top.
Finally, we have one of the most requested features on Facebook. Not being able to send messages to groups with more than 1,000 members has been a huge headache for a ton of people trying to spread news throughout their groups. Perhaps that problem will be rectified with this impending update.
While none of these new features are shockers, they are welcome additions and should add some much needed functionality to the site.