I’ve only been on Facebook for a little while; I visit my turf there once or twice a day when a friending request comes in (I wonder if/when they’ll quit flowing?) I accept them from anyone I actually know. Sometime in recent days the “Reject” button went away, to be replaced by an “Ignore” button. Much less uncomfortable to click on, wouldn’t you say? I wonder if the experience is less painful for the ignoree than the rejectee? (I haven’t got around to propositioning anyone in weeks, so I don’t know). Facebook feels increasingly anodyne; maybe that’s the point?
Contributions
Comment feed for ongoing:
From: Pierre Phaneuf (Jul 18 2007, at 21:49)
I think it always had the same effect, it's only the button's label that has been updated.
I'm sure a bunch of people just left a number of unanswered requests lying about...
[link]
From: Ted Han (Jul 18 2007, at 21:56)
Although i haven't bothered checking for the change, i think this finally clears up what the reject/ignore button does. The way facebook works, rejections are never propagated to the applicant. Thus ignore seems much more apt semantically. And frankly, if my choices are to be a reject or to be ignored, i'm not sure that there's much cause to prefer one over the other. :P
[link]
From: Ryan Lowe (Jul 21 2007, at 14:11)
I agree with Ted: the wording better conveys what's actually happening. Some of my friends were worried that others would see that they 'rejected' a friend request and be offended, particularly when that person is a co-worker or family member.
Why increasingly anodyne? Facebook's audience is expanding. College students can put up with terse phrasing but the general public is less receptive. One could argue that modern websites have conditioned young people to accept it without thinking about it. There's a delicate balance between brevity and politeness. As a "user" I'd rather save usability time and screen space than feel good about my 'user experience'.
I just hope Facebook doesn't go too far off the deep end here and become too formal and polite. We already have LinkedIn for co-workers and colleagues -- Facebook isn't meant for that and shouldn't be that.
Facebook shouldn't forget it started out being cool with a very picky age group. Part of staying cool is not being too polite and boring.
There's magic in sharing personal details and photos with small and exclusive networks. There's no magic about carefully sharing almost nothing with everyone you've ever come in contact with (and everyone in the city you live in AND the colleges you went to).
Facebook is for friends!
[link]