By Kyle McCabe | April 22, 2010
I like it. Kind of. Like, maybe.
This month Facebook started rolling out a change to “fan pages” that takes the “fans” out of the picture. Now instead of becoming a “fan” of something, you simply “like” it.
I guess the reasoning is that becoming a “fan” is too much of a social investment for people, resulting in lower page activity than Facebook desires. I get that. There are plenty of brands, organizations, causes and such that I “like” but wouldn’t consider myself a “fan” of.
The problem is they took away fans, but replaced them with… nothing. What do you call those people now? Likers? Former fans? We have a verb replacing a noun, and it just doesn’t work. They thought “fan” was a little too high on the approval scale, but they overcompensated by plummeting to a mere appetitive whim. Blaaaaaah. It’s weaksauce (that’s right, weaksauce).
Like it or not (I’m punny), it seems to be a permanent change. So no more Fan Pages. No more fans. We’re all just people again.
But the burning question I think we’re all asking is this: where the DEUCE is our “dislike” button?
There’s your shot from the hip for this week.
