In a few hours from now, i.e. on March 7, 2013, Facebook is going to unveil its latest News Feed layout. As much as it is an important asset for the company, the ad execs and regular Facebook users are anxiously anticipating the upcoming changes. Are they going to be for the better of common public, or is it just another gimmick to help advertisers and companies make more money?

If it’s one thing that we all know; Facebook is going to do a lot more than mere window dressing. The news feed layout change is definitely going to be a big change after a long time. The key factor is that Mark Zuckerberg’s social network has made this news feed section renovation after collecting 9 years of non stop data.

The way consumers click, interaction patterns, how ads are placed at Facebook, why people click at certain section of the old news feed – so on and so forth. All these factors were kept in mind while the Facebook developers worked their assess off on making this new change. If this news feed thing is going to enhance the optimal viewing percentile, I am all up for it.

TechCrunch gurus said that Facebook users will now be able to scan “a photos only feed of Facebook and Instagram images” that are shared directly through the computer, or some portable device. In fact, the listening habits of friends, and friends of friends were also considered when the social network was in the middle of implementing these major updates.

However, throughout the entire news feed rush, Facebook ads will become even harder to ignore. After all, that’s one of the primary purposes of Facebook; to let people click ads and help advertisers make money off it. Back in September 2006, the Facebook news feed was in fact the “new” and viral thing. It has been a long time since these guys have developed something.

From a user’s perspective, Facebook changes are always strongly resented. People become used to a specific layout and whenever something is being changed, they feel uneasy. You do remember the entire Facebook Timeline fiasco. I’d have appreciated if Facebook left it on users to decide whether they wanted Timeline or not. On the contrary, the company applied that change without end users’ consent.

But now, ever since the Timeline has been applied, Facebook users are not complaining that much. They have become used to this change. Likewise, the latest news feed changes are going to be a little irritating in the beginning, but everything will settle down after a few months of rigorous usage.

On an overall scale, it is strongly felt that a change is needed. I mean, cmon’; you have been using the same old Facebook news feed layout for a long time now. Seriously, this is year 2013 – don’t you think everything deserves something different? After years of wear and tear, the Facebook news feed section is something that has become obscure.

In fact, even Yahoo made announcements concerning its latest “infinite newsfeed” implementations. We already covered that in one of our recent articles at ‘The National’. You can read it here. Speaking of recent posts, there we also wrote about why Facebook is becoming less popular among teenagers. Youngsters prefer using other application, which the social media giant had been ignoring for a while.

To retain its users and to develop an average teenager’s interest, the new newsfeed is probably the best strategy right now. Also, Facebook has been having perception problems from adults these days. Parents have been prying and complaining way too much about irrelevant content, Facebook privacy policies, which are always going to be fucked up, and many other things. Such factors force parents and guardians to either suggest Facebook alternatives to their kids, or completely put the social media website off use.

Facebook believes that by bringing the latest changes to the news feed section, the company will be promoting relevant content.  At this particular moment, it is a little hard to say anything about the Facebook news feed. I am gonna have to wait for a few hours, until CEO Mark Zuckerberg or his associates will take the podium to explain why the latest change is mandatory.