Facebook's newest button feature makes you forget pick-up lines or even stalking your friend's post every single day to trace any spill on current relationship status. The social media network's team suggests, why not just "Ask" them directly?
"Ask" is Facebook's new way of digging into a user's undisclosed personal life, but not making the questioning and answers public. Yes, think current relationship status, job affiliation and school attended, among others.
Try visiting a friend's profile on a mobile or desktop Web browser, an "Ask" button appears in the "about" section. In case a user leaves some personal information empty, his friends can obtain those by clicking "Ask" button. After clicking the button, a prompt appears also asking the user's reason for asking a friend of the info. An optional blank text field also shows up.
The user in question receives the notification on what is being asked and can reply by filling up the text field or check through a list of choices for, say, relationship status. The reply remains private between the person who asked and the person being asked. Here's the thing: the "Ask" feature may be around to nudge the user on things he prefers to keep private, but at the same time, he can always leave the question ignored or unanswered.
ArsTechnica asked Facebook a few questions on the latest modification. For one, if these private replies to questions asked will, in any way, affect the service of the social media in terms of targeted advertising. It also asked the reasons of Facebook for providing users a direct method for asking personal details, which are in the first place already made hidden.
"A Facebook representative responded to say that this 'ask' feature has been rolled out in waves to users since January, though when asked pointedly whether this was in the form of the obvious 'ask' button that is now live across the site, or previously reported functionality buried in users' profiles, the representative was unable to clarify. Our additional questions about how 'private' response data would be handled, and why Facebook made the change, remained unanswered," ArsTechnica reported.
It was reported late in 2013 that an algorithm was created by Lars Backstrom, senior engineer of Facebook, and Jon Kleinberg, computer scientist at Cornell University, which identifies the real romantic partners of its users as well as any impending break-up among them. It was also reported before that Facebook has no current intention of rolling out such findings in its social network, but may help the company laser target advertisements and content for users.
Some observers think Facebook's new "Ask" feature seems to be eyeing on targeted ads from dating sites and apps, which have gained popularity and success. However, with the new feature, asking can only be done among friends in Facebook, so strangers remain off the hook. Others also question the use of the new button or what makes it different from, say, privately messaging the user to get the same undisclosed info.
