Facebook rolls out new version of search

Facebook - searching for an answer to Twitter
Facebook - searching for an answer to Twitter

Facebook has rolled out its new search update to a select few users, which brings 'up-to-the-minute' results to the website.

This is a significant upgrade to Facebook, which is trying to offer similar features as that plucky little start-up called Twitter.

According to Facebook's blog post, the upgrade will allow you to "search your News Feed for the most recent status updates, photos, links, videos and notes being shared by your friends and the Facebook Pages of which you're a fan."

The post also notes: "You will also be able to search for status updates, posted links and notes in Search from people who have chosen to make their profile and content available to everyone."

Everyone button

In order for the search to truly work, Facebook is hoping that many more users will make their updates public. The new search is good for looking through your friend's feeds systematically but doesn't make use of all of the information on the website.

This is unlike Twitter, where you can search pretty much every user's feed and get 'live' results of what people are Tweeting about.

This is all set to change, however, with Tech Crunch reporting that Facebook is set to make updating publicly easier.

The website is to do this by introducing an 'everyone' button that you can press for updates. This is instead of having to search through the website's laborious privacy settings each and every time you want a wider Facebook audience to read your stuff.

Marc Chacksfield

Marc Chacksfield is the Editor In Chief, Shortlist.com at DC Thomson. He started out life as a movie writer for numerous (now defunct) magazines and soon found himself online - editing a gaggle of gadget sites, including TechRadar, Digital Camera World and Tom's Guide UK. At Shortlist you'll find him mostly writing about movies and tech, so no change there then.