Facebook’s New Feature – “Happening Now”

I was pleasantly surprised and excited to see that Facebook had launched another new feature, which is currently in the middle of its rollout plan. While you may not find anything different in your profile, some users have got this feature for test purpose. Out of 20 employees at Cygnis Media, (who spend more than 12 hours using Facebook) only one (our CTO) had this feature activated on his profile. I fortunately had a chance to sit with the lucky person and use the feature through his profile.

In what is a direct shot at Twitter, the new feature is called “Happening Now” and features live updates. The Happening now feature is located at the right side of the screen when a user starts using an application. This feature exclusively deals with the applications, which the user interacts with.

It features live updates from a user’s friends, such as posts, comments and likes etc., allowing the user to know which applications are being used by his / her friends and what activity is being performed within them.

At the top of the feature 5 icons are displayed, 4 for the recently used applications and the 5th icon provides the user an overall number of Facebook application requests or invites from friends for the applications in which user is enrolled.

The feature as Facebook named ,”Happening Now,” is a nice update, but this might affect the privacy of the user. Suppose I do not want anyone to know that I am using a particular application, I do not have the authority to do so, as this feature would provide the update to my friends. So, my hopes are that Facebook gives the user authority to enable or disable this feature.