Facebook Expanding Graph Search to All U.S. Users

Brace yourself, Facebook users. A change is coming. ?

The social network on Monday will begin rolling out its new advanced Graph Search feature to English-speaking users in the U.S., Facebook announced in a blog post.

First unveiled in January, Graph Search offers a new way for Facebook users to wade through the 1 trillion connections on the site for information about what their friends like, where they've been, and more.

Graph Search initially launched in beta, and since then, "tens of millions of people" have tested it out, Facebook said. Facebook has since tweaked the feature so it's faster and understands more ways of asking questions. The company also improved search results so that the most relevant answers appear fist, and made the interface easier to use.

"This is just the beginning," Facebook said. "We're currently working on making it easier for people to search and discover topics, including posts and comments. We're also working on getting mobile Graph Search ready."

If you don't see the change right away, sit tight. It will take a few weeks before all U.S. users have the new feature, though many will get it this week.

Graph Search seeks to make users' individual networks much more useful as tools for finding things like restaurants recommended by one's friends, places they've visited, or photos with shared themes or locations across a friend network. Possible Graph Search use cases might include queries like, "Mexican restaurants in Palo Alto, California my friends have been to," "languages my friends speak," or "photos of my friends in London."

As Graph Search rolls out, users well see a notice on their home page with a reminder about how to control the information they share. The feature is tailored to everyone, based on what has been shared with them.

"For example, if you search for 'Photos of San Francisco,' you'll see photos your friends took there and shared with you, as well as Public photos," Facebook said. "This means if someone else does the same search, they're going to see different results because they have different friends, and different photos have been shared with them."

Some of those results can be quite amusing. The Actual Facebook Graph Searches Tumblr includes screenshots from the more bizarre and entertaining Facebook Graph search results, including a query for "mothers of Jews who like bacon" (fewer than 100 people found).

For more, see PCMag's What's Wrong (and Right) With Facebook Graph Search and the slideshow above.

Source: http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2421435,00.asp?kc=PCRSS05079TX1K0000993

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