Yesterday I spent the better part of the morning working on a custom Facebook Page Welcome Tab design for my client, Old Republic Home Protection. ORHP is launching their company Facebook Page today and we were putting the finishing touches on the default landing page - the fancy welcome page that visitors see if they have not yet clicked the "like" button for the page.
For those of you who don't know what I'm talking about, there are businesses of every size all over Facebook that use this tactic to engage their Facebook Page visitors in a way that is unique and encourages clicking the "like" button, which then adds the new visitor to their fan base. It is a common practice and one that has birthed an additional service that I provide as a designer. I recently launched my own bkmacdaddy designs Facebook Page and crafted a Welcome tab of my own, which then in turn inspired clients to request this service from me. It's a great way to make a strong statement for your business on Facebook, to engage customers, clients and visitors, and to grow your network.
So yesterday, just as I finished setting up the tab design and it was sent to the client for final approval, something happened. Facebook Pages suddenly looked different. There were no tabs at the top of the page, and the Welcome tab I had just finished creating was nowhere to be found. On top of that, multiple layout changes were appearing, and Facebook.com was loading slowly or not at all sometimes.
I freaked out. Just a little.
I jumped on Twitter to ask if anyone else was having this problem. I scanned the feed to see that something was definitely going on with Facebook but no one knew what or why. I skimmed my RSS reader to see if there were any new articles announcing the changes.
I remembered that I had read something about Facebook removing the tab feature on Pages sometime in the future, but I couldn't believe it was happening right this moment and without any type of announcement or press release. Even more disturbing was the thought that no one would ever again be able to set a default landing page. That functionality had disappeared.
I was in shock. How could Facebook suddenly and without warning remove this function that huge business like Coca-Cola and Target were utilizing? More importantly to me, how could they suddenly kill a service that my business provides and remove that source of income?
After a few minutes of talking with some people via Twitter, I decided to wait it out. I realized that something strange was happening with Facebook and quite possibly within the next few hours everything would be made clear. Besides, I had a parent-teacher conference to go to, so I could wait and check on it when I got back.
Of course, less than two hours later the tabs were back. While I was gone, the entire Facebook site shut down for about 30 minutes and soon a series of tweets from Facebook apologized and explained that "some internal prototypes were exposed to people and resulted in us disabling the site briefly. It's now back to normal."
I imagine this was followed by a global sigh of relief, as myself and countless others welcomed back our precious tabs and default landing pages. Then the discussion began. "But for how long?" "How long will tabs still be there?" "When will they be gone for good, as we were told they someday would be?" "Will we still be able to set our default landing page without our beloved tabs?"
It wasn't more than a few minutes until I began to laugh at myself.
What has happened to our society that some of the biggest news of the day is a social network site going offline or making changes to its layout? Why do we get in such a monumental panic about something so absolutely trivial when compared with real problems for real people in real places all over this earth?
It's the holiday season, a time that many people give to others more than any other time of the year. Charities and food banks and Salvation Army finally get some much-needed attention and donations. Children and families that suffer from starvation, homelessness, disease, slavery and many other horrible circumstances receive a momentary reprieve thanks to the generosity of others that is spurred on by the spirit of this season. Heck, Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg made multi-million dollar donations to charity himself this month.
So why in the world am I freaking out about Facebook Tabs when I don't even pause for a moment to be outraged at how many children are dying from AIDS, or being sold into slavery, or starving while I eat my Thanksgiving leftovers?
I'm not trying to make myself or you feel guilty. I'm just trying to get a better perspective to take hold in our lives, starting with my own.
Seriously. What are we doing right now that could have a positive impact in another person's life? Or are we too busy worrying about our Facebook Tabs?