Facebook Shows Application Requests in the Notification Channel in Potentially Significant Test
Facebook is conducting a short term test showing application requests in the notifications channel. It will analyze the effects of the change before concluding whether to further roll out application request notifications.
By showing these requests in a persistently visible, frequently checked channel alongside notifications about system actions such as a user being mentioned in a post or tagged in a photo, Facebook may be able to assist developers with app discovery and user retention.
Applications could previously send messages directly to users as notifications, but lost access to the notifications channel in February. Facebook made major changes to the Platform in September, removing stories about in-game content from the feeds of non-gamers, leaving only app discovery stories about friends starting to use an app. Facebook also moved app invites and requests from the Requests panel to the Application and Game Dashboards. Many developers complained that these changes significantly hurt discovery and retention, leading Facebook to bring app invites and requests back to the Requests panel.
Facebook has sought to improve relations with developers of all sizes through improved outreach, documentation, and reliability as part of “Operation Developer Love.” But its access to communication and viral channels which are the biggest concern for most developers. Removing these channels makes it especially difficult for smaller developers to compete with larger ones which can pay for massive advertising campaigns and cross-promote to kickstart new apps.
The introduction of application requests and invites to the notifications channel could be some of the change developers have been waiting for. Facebook improved the visibility of this channel earlier this year by showing alerts of notifications on browser tabs opened to Facebook. The red counters on the notifications icon are difficult to ignore, so these notifications could lead users to more frequently visit the dashboards where they can respond to requests and invites.
Facebook must try to assist developers without detracting from the user experience. Some might be frustrated about notifications which distract them from their browsing but don’t link to more intimate social activity such as a friend Liking their status update or writing on their wall. CEO Mark Zuckerberg said “one of the biggest drivers of negative experiences has been games”, and these notifications could remind users of the days when their home page and news feed were flooded by app spam. However, these notifications can only be generated by explicit actions of a user’s friends, which could set the right balance between annoyance and obscurity for applications.
December 9th, 2010 at 6:03 pm
Facebook needs to make up its minds! Thank god i deleted my facebook, si I dont have to complain about some nre page layout that they hve
December 10th, 2010 at 6:35 pm
With games now generating over 100 requests per day, I do hope that Facebook will provide us with a means to turn off these application request notifications if we so desire.
It is bad enough when snag-bar or bonus grabbers spam us with computer generated ‘like’ notifications, at least with them, we can either request our ‘friends’ turn off the notication or remove them from our friends list.
To now force us to wade through pages of notifications in order to find those that we want to know about is pure madness and will drive people onto alternate social networks that don’t have this ‘new feature’ that most users don’t want.
If they MUST put this application request counter in a more prominent position, then at least put it as a 4th counter at the top, so users can distinguish between gifts/requests from the applications & their friends comments/tags.
December 10th, 2010 at 8:13 pm
I hate you people at Facebook for doing this.
Normally when I click the globe icon I see an average of four notifications. This is standard; I have to click ‘See all notifications’ if I want more. Well thanks to this lovely change I am going to either have to start clicking ‘See all’ a LOT more often (all four at the moment are game-related app requests) or just ignore these entirely.
Look…I don’t mind ‘X has posted to your Wall.’ That’s forgivable and if I start getting spammed by some idiot I stupidly made a decision to friend because he was level 52,021 or whatever, that’s fine with me. I can choose to hide him or that particular application request from my wall.
How the heck am I supposed to hide THESE? At least give us the option, then you could track who is choosing to do it. I know I would! I would rather see one or two ‘X has posted on your wall’ from FrontierVille than four or five ‘X has sent you a request’ .
Right now all four of my ‘default’ notifications are taken up thanks to the fact that I play FrontierVille, FarmVille, Mafia Wars and Cafe World. So what am I supposed to do? I already hate Zynga, the company behind these games, for being a bunch of greedy snots and trying to both rip off and overcharge their players. Now I am supposed to add some frustration from YOU guys on this TOO? It’s the holidays people, I can only take so much frustration and stress before I want to put Santa in a choke-hold. And while I have my arms strongly around his neck, right before he passes out from lack of air I am going to whisper in his ear “Can you give the people at Facebook who decided to put application requests in notifications some coal for me?”
Once he wakes up and gets away from my house as fast as possible, I’ll hopefully see a few lumps falling from the sleigh in your general direction. If not, well, maybe Santa just enjoys being informed that six people have sent him a request in Frontierville, who knows? He’s probably an avid player, after all there IS a winter theme there now complete with snowmen and reindeer.
STOP IT. STOP IT NOW. AUGH.
December 10th, 2010 at 8:32 pm
DISLIKE immensely. I don’t mind if they did this if we had the option to turn it off! I’m happy getting just my app notifications in the side bar!!
December 11th, 2010 at 8:26 am
WHERE DO I STOP THIS – WHERE DO I COMPLAIN SO THIS ISN’T PERMANENT?
December 11th, 2010 at 7:43 pm
I really wish facebook would make it easier to let them know how we feel about changes made. I HATE this notification crap! I can already see that I have game requests on the game tab. Why would I want my notifications ALSO spammed? And I also hate how they now post what you say on everyone’s pictures and walls for all your friends to see. =.= It’s none of Joe’s business what I post on Jenny’s pictures. Really. =.=
December 12th, 2010 at 12:14 am
I’ve disabled all games because of that. I liked them, but I cannot live with that notification spam.
December 12th, 2010 at 1:09 am
[...] folks at Inside Facebook have been able to confirm that this is a test being performed by Facebook proper, in an effort to [...]
December 12th, 2010 at 3:05 am
Hate this – I will delete all games if I cannot turn this off. Bad move facebook.
December 12th, 2010 at 4:21 am
They need to get rid of this ASAP! Its driving me crazy
December 12th, 2010 at 7:31 am
What idiot thought this was a good idea? Maybe they are getting kick backs from zynga so all we see is zynga therefore making us want to play all zynga games and buy zynga cash.
There did I advertise enough for zynga?
December 12th, 2010 at 7:52 am
It is extremely annoying.
I used to enjoy seeing the red bubble, it meant someone commented or liked or posted something for me. Not a stupid game notification !!!
We get the notifications in two different places inside the game and one area outside – I will stop playing altogether if they persist in making me choose.
Please, please, please make it optional – those that want it can choose it.
December 12th, 2010 at 8:02 am
[...] Facebook Shows Application Requests in the Notification Channel in Potentially Significant Test [...]
December 12th, 2010 at 10:42 am
This is VERY annoying!! Stop it or at least give us the option to choose if we want the game requests in the notification channel!!
I don’t like this at all!
December 12th, 2010 at 11:45 am
Just another voice saying I Dislike (oh facebook, if only you had such an option) this new idea. INTENSELY annoying. If the gamemakers want it so much, I’ll quit those games…much as I like them, those notifications are THAT annoying.
December 12th, 2010 at 2:48 pm
I totally agree with these complaints!!! Please, please, stop all of this. I don’t need to know who sends me requests, I am smart enough to know that I need to look for them! As mentioned above, the notifications are fine to have in the sidebar next to the app. name.
22 notifications in just 6-7 hrs. just today. I have people at different time zones and on at different times of the day and I just know this is jut the tip of the iceberg of what I’m going to get bombarded with in the next 24hrs.
Please don’t be like Myspace with trying to fix something that’s not even broken!
December 12th, 2010 at 3:44 pm
I think that you guys have made a big mistake.. I spent most of my time that i have on facebook trying to stop the notifications! I play tons of games and have no problem getting my request from the game bar that you have created… I dislike not seeing when my friends have left a post or a comment on my photos or wall because of how you have changed everything… there is an old saying if it aint broke dont fix it… you are constantly upsetting people by all the changes.. just when we get used to the new format and how to find everything things are changed once again! I do understand the need to make things better but getting notifications that this and that person sent you gifts… to tell you the truth i could really care less. Running a biz as well as staying in touch with my friends is where i need the notifications and alerts not to games that im playing!
December 12th, 2010 at 3:53 pm
And here I thought we already had game request notifications. Stupid me!!! Come on Facebook, it’s perfectly fine the way it is. I can already see how many “Game Request” notifications I have in the left column without being ANNOYED by the additional pop-up in the lower left corner, AND the red flag on my (world) icon for what should remain NON-GAME notifications. For those who don’t have games, this will be a further deterrent to use Facebook as their “primary” social application. By the way, I see that I currently have 2 game requests WITHOUT having had to be notified two additional times! How dumb!
December 12th, 2010 at 4:16 pm
This is ridiculous! Facebook, stop punishing the gamer and just make it easier to get my game requests, see my friends notifications and let me get on with real life.
December 12th, 2010 at 4:33 pm
Yes, I agree, this is HORRIBLE! I used to check the on-site notifications specifically to see ONLY who liked or commented on my posts, or posted to my wall. Now, it’s impossible and I am very upset about this! I already now that 34 people have sent me gifts in Farmville, and have already received them! I want it changed back, or turned off! Tell us where we vote on this? DISLIKE!
December 12th, 2010 at 4:42 pm
this is a HUGE incentive for me to go and turn off ALL apps.
December 12th, 2010 at 4:55 pm
This is horrid. Now I have THREE areas telling me I have a game request. On the right; which redirects me to the one on the left, and now my notifications. It’s beyond redundant. I don’t like it whatsoever, and neither do any of my gaming and non-gaming friends. Like someone else said above, I now have to wade through all these redundant game notifications, to get to the notifications that matter.
December 12th, 2010 at 7:05 pm
DISLIKE!!!! This is completely redundant, since application notifications are already prominately displayed. Please either allow the option to turn this off, or just TURN IT OFF. Grrrrrr….
December 12th, 2010 at 7:21 pm
OMG GET RID OF THIS! It’s so annoying! I know how to FIND my notifications, thanks. Some people out there CHOOSE to ignore them on purpose. I, for one, check them practically everyday, no thanks to notifications. I do this on my own!
December 12th, 2010 at 7:21 pm
**I know how to FIND my requests, thanks.
December 12th, 2010 at 8:00 pm
plz gives us the option to turn these annoying notifications off. i absolutely hate them
December 12th, 2010 at 8:22 pm
This is AWFUL. I hate hate hate it. At least give us the option to turn it OFF. Then track THAT to see how much people “like” it. I have yet to see one person like this new feature. Everyone Ive spoken to or have seen post on forums hate it. My valid notifications are getting BURIED and I only play 3 games. PLEEEEEEEASE make it go away. Its driving me insane.
December 13th, 2010 at 1:06 am
if this is made permanent it will kill facebook games, it’s the most annoying change that has ever been done to facebook and 100% of my facebook game friends agree. We all plan on quitting if this can’t be disabled. Seriously, it has to be your guy’s stupidest idea yet (and there have been a whole lot of stupid ideas.)
December 13th, 2010 at 7:47 am
please give me the option of turning this thing off………it slows down everything and i can’t find the notifications that i really want to see
December 13th, 2010 at 8:40 am
Turn the bloody thing off. It is a king sized pain in the back side and completely stupid and unnecessary. There are enough annoying things about FB without adding one this big.
December 13th, 2010 at 10:57 am
No like Seriously, I’ve noticed that this was here ever since it was put in, and I’ve hated it ever since. I like just normal notifications in the notifications bar, like why mess with it?? TURN IT BACK OR LET ME TURN IT OFF…
Either that or I’m no longer playing any games, simple as that…
December 13th, 2010 at 11:43 am
It is pain in the ass.you go on your facebook
and you have tons of notifications just for gifts that you got drop this now it is a pain in the ass
December 13th, 2010 at 12:20 pm
Hey FB fuck the developers, you need to pay attention to your USERS!
Removing games from the notifications was a GOOD thing! don’t stuff [retracted] back into FB just to make a couple extra dollars
December 13th, 2010 at 12:37 pm
take this thing out period
December 13th, 2010 at 7:11 pm
Absolutely AGREE with all of the comments… If Facebook wants to keep this it should be an OPTION, not a requirement. I can’t stand this mess. I am about to quit all of my games too.
December 13th, 2010 at 7:50 pm
PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE, tell me that this thing with the notifications isn’t going to stay. It drives a person nuts! Isn’t that the whole point to the game requests?? Requests go there and WE check them when ready to, not because the notifications are going over board.
December 13th, 2010 at 7:50 pm
Please remove this feature. Game Request Notification on the side is enough. It’s stacking my notification unnnecessarily.
December 13th, 2010 at 7:54 pm
Please turn this off. It overrides other important notifications.
December 13th, 2010 at 8:44 pm
Please remove this feature. I will delete the games if I continue to get spammed with notications. And as many, many people seem to have made the same complaint I don’t see how it could be HELPING the developers. All it is doing is annoying people and making them not want to play the games anymore.
December 13th, 2010 at 8:47 pm
This is one of the stupidest ideas you guys at Facebook have come up with. Since all I do on Facebook is play games (9 to be exact)this new feature is EXTREMELY annoying. I think I know where to find my game requests by now as I can find them either on the game itself or on the left side of my news feed. What I can’t find now are the notifications of when my friends post to my wall or comment on a post.
I guess I’ll just stay off of Facebook till this nonsense is cleared up and go straight to Zynga.com or Gamers Unite to get my game feeds for the games I play. Gee, I guess that would mean I wouldn’t be seeing your advertiser’s ads and I’ll DEFINITELY WON’T BE BUYING ANYMORE FACEBOOK CREDITS!
December 14th, 2010 at 8:19 am
This feature is awful and has lead me to delete a few games. It’s especially frustrating checking facebook on my phone. Get rid of the testing ASAP.
December 14th, 2010 at 11:48 am
It is horrible, horrible, horrible – REALLY annoying, I already get email notifications, notifications at the side, a ‘games’ section, WTF do I need this for? I like to see what my FRIENDS are doing, NOT get MORE AND MORE GAMES CRAP.
Dunno why FB couldn’t at least have given us the option of turning it off. Oh, but of course, that would mean they were interested in personal choice.
I spend money on sorority life – but am notifying Playdom that I am spending NOTHING whilst these notifications are in place – if the games developers don’t want this either, we may have a chance of getting rid.
December 14th, 2010 at 12:59 pm
I have been telling myself that these games are a huge time waste and now with the notification BS I think I’m finally ready to pull the plug on facebook games.
December 14th, 2010 at 1:08 pm
It is extremely annoying.
December 14th, 2010 at 2:02 pm
As a LONG time user of Facebook, I can tell you that I do NOT like the little notifications that pop up in the bottom left area of my FB window – it is very annoying and is actually causing some lag. I play 6 or 7 game apps that are very active and you can only imagine – between gift requests and sends, plus wall posts (etc) how many pop ups I get…. PLEASE give us the option to shut these off, or not, or whatever… PLEASE!! Honestly, I have the notications icon in the top area of my FB page that tells me – I don’t need the pop-ups too.
December 14th, 2010 at 5:42 pm
This “test” is most annoying and if you guys were Klingons I would have ordered you executed or shoved out the nearest airlock into space by now. I haven’t seen anything so annoying since that horrid Yogi Bear movie trailer. Well actually the Gulliver’s Travels trailer is even worse and makes me want to vomit. However if I keep seeing notifications for games like I am now I can not guarentee that the contents of my stomach will stay away from the opening of my throat. Bastards.
December 14th, 2010 at 7:21 pm
OMG MAKE IT STOP!!!!!!!!! MAKE IT STOP!!! I enjoy playing the games on Facebook, but these notifications are driving me insane. Some of us have facebook on our phones. My phone goes off more then people call me. Every time I go to swipe them off my phone they open up and my battery ends up draining quicker on my cell. I don’t need to know if Joe picks his nose in frontierville!
December 14th, 2010 at 9:43 pm
I HATE this feature!!!!! Make it go away!!!
December 14th, 2010 at 11:19 pm
Facebook. Your test is an utter FAILURE. Either turn the crap off or you, as well as the few games I still play, will PERMANENTLY lose my patronage. How is that for retention. I like keeping in touch with people on Facebook and refuse to have to wade through game crap to find social posts and will block every single damn App on here if this ‘feature’ is not removed.
Whoever came up with this brilliant idea needs to be publicly humiliated then fired for their stupidity.
December 15th, 2010 at 6:57 am
I concur with basically all of the above. There needs to be a way to turn this off. It’s extremely distracting.
I’d rather disable all these applications than have these notifications constantly spamming me.
December 15th, 2010 at 1:03 pm
Whaddya mean, I can’t turn this crap off?! Have you lost your minds??!! It was bad enough when you removed our ability to edit our own posts (resulting in having to copy and repost entire paragraphs to correct one little typo).
Oh well. I was wasting too much time on Farmville as it was. Too bad for the Zynga people.
December 15th, 2010 at 1:19 pm
all history data
December 15th, 2010 at 6:09 pm
Worst “improvement” ever!!! Notifications are for personal items. The game requests list is for game requests. Getting a hundred notifications a day for things that I am being notified of on the games request list and then often RENOTIFIED of inside the game platform itself is overkill of the worst sort. MAKE IT STOP. MAKE IT STOP NOW!!!!!
December 15th, 2010 at 10:14 pm
Guys,
this is what my notifications look like right now (with names and profile images edited out for privacy reasons):
[img]http://img28.imageshack.us/img28/3349/newfacebooknotification.jpg[/img]
http://img28.imageshack.us/img28/3349/newfacebooknotification.jpg
Can you PLEASE not make this a permanent feature?? Before this I would have a few notifications per day, ‘X likes your’ or ‘Y has posted to your wall’ or ‘F has posted a response to’ etc.
I didn’t mind that.
I greatly mind THIS.
I already know who has sent me what through the ‘Game Requests’ link on the left side of my screen. Unless you plan to remove that — AND PLEASE DON’T — I don’t need any of this ‘new’ change. THANK YOU.
December 16th, 2010 at 12:39 am
I do not like this. But I have to suffer through this because I’m a gopher who means nothing to Facebook. I’m earning them another follower, simply put, and now, not only have I managed to find friends from years ago on here, but now Facebook thinks applications are more important than reconnecting with old friends. So what is social networking if applications are considered a higher priority than finding lost family and friends from time?
I have read these comments, and I see that no one likes not being able to make our own decisions about what we want and don’t want on our home pages. All of the posts that I think may have importance have been overrun by useless games that had no effect on me for the 25 years before I started Facebook, and they are now being shoved into my daily life incessantly.
Cease and desist. And fire the person who thought this a good idea, you numbskulls. What honestly made you think it would be a good idea to aggravate your loyal and avid fans? This is senseless; absurd; ridiculous; counter-productive on your end; illogical; stupid. End this nonsensical test as soon as possible. Hopefully in an hour or so. And shame on you for making such a terrible and unwise decision. Bad. Horrible. An embarrassment on your behalf.
December 16th, 2010 at 2:19 am
Stop this notification spam! Have never been so irritated by a FB change yet.
December 16th, 2010 at 10:50 am
Did you get the message from the posts above? Not only that nobody needs this, worse is that since this useless change I miss notifications on posts and comments … that’s very bad for a social community. Stop this crap immediately!!!
December 16th, 2010 at 11:26 am
PLEASE at least allow us the option to stop this or leave it. It is extremely annoying.Make it stop!
December 17th, 2010 at 4:19 am
I no longer look forward to hopping on facebook cause of these damn app notifications! TURN THIS CRAP OFF! Man, do I feel bad for all the gamers playing more than ONE game, or better yet, who aren’t playing any and don’t know how to block an app. DUMB IDEA FB. Don’t waste another week ‘testing’ this. We beg of you
December 17th, 2010 at 5:47 am
Please take it off! It’s creating a lot of confusion and honestly it decreases the quality of facebook (and my life).
December 17th, 2010 at 7:37 am
I absolutely hate these notifications. I feel like I am being spammed every second I am on facebook. Obnoxious as hell. Please make it stop!
December 17th, 2010 at 12:51 pm
please get rid of this it is very annoying and everyone that I have talked to does not like it
December 18th, 2010 at 6:54 am
Still waiting for them to undo this idiocy. This is worse than a spammed news feed, at least you can edit your news feed. You can’t turn off this idiot idea on the red alerts. FACEBOOK, THIS SUCKS, UNDO IT NOW!!!
December 18th, 2010 at 6:59 am
This is incredibly annoying. For game posts we have a notification on the left of the screen, another on the right of the screen & now under the notification button at the top of the screen. Just how many times do we need to be told that we have game requests to be accepted?? It’s ridiculous. I have to wade through lists of “these people have sent you 14 requests” just to find anything important like wall posts or comments. Keep the request information under the REQUEST section for goodness sake!
December 18th, 2010 at 8:36 am
I hate this and hate that I don’t have a choice about receiving this crap. A ton of people play those games non stop and I am being inundated with these notifications which makes it very difficult to find the notifications for comments and posts that I actually want to see.
December 19th, 2010 at 12:27 am
i agree with the above – it is annoying and since requests are send to the notifications i miss out on personal stuff, like comments on wall posts i made, etc.
it won’t end up making the application better known – if that’s the reason for this crab – it will end up, at least for me, in leaving the game – because i will not miss out on personal comments and wall posts for playing a stupid game. games were fun so far – seems like this is changing.
just please stop this! soon!
December 19th, 2010 at 2:55 am
STOP THIS TEST IMMEDIATELY !!!! IT’S EXTREMELY ANNOYING !
December 19th, 2010 at 5:11 am
You stop this nonsense. NOW. Lately the fun in those games was reduced by constant clicking outside the game instead of actually playing the game just to get rid of pop-ups, updates and notifications, and now Facebook starts spamming us, too?! Do you want us to enjoy playing or what?!
December 19th, 2010 at 5:34 am
Epic fail, time to turn it off. Unless the goal is to get FB users to block all applications.
December 19th, 2010 at 9:27 am
I very much dislike this, I am unable to catch the important updates from the application ones. I care not about game/application requests, just whats posted on my wall.
December 19th, 2010 at 10:14 pm
Ditto ditto ditto ditto ditto. Seriously, how could the makers of facebook not foresee that this SUCKS. I have to filter through all that junk to see if anyone has actually posted to my wall. There used to at least be an “x” on the notifications area where you could “choose to hide this type of notification.”
OFF TOPIC: Oh yea, and facebook could also improve the game request part too. Like when I accept a gift on the Cafe World dashboard, why doesn’t the request outside of the dashboard disappear? About 25% of the time when I go to accept the request it will go through a second time, great for getting double your worth out of the gift. I mean, sometimes a request for something will be sent from my husband’s account and I can accept it through the dashboard on my account and then go to Game Requests and accept it there too. The other 75% of the time you have to go through the time to click accept and get the error saying “oops, this gift has already been accepted, possibly through blah blah blah” or “something has gone wrong in the kitchen.” —Now, I’m no dummy. I KNOW I could just click ignore on all the requests for an app if I know I have accepted all of its gifts once through its dashboard. However, there MAY be new gifts lost that I need but didn’t see at my game dashboard, plus those (oops) duplicate gifts I mentioned would be lost. Do NOT, however, take away my dashboard gift accepting. Much more efficient and going in the right direction but seriously, it shouldn’t have taken this long to work out these kinks.
December 19th, 2010 at 11:09 pm
These are as annoying and unnecessary as all the popups within Zynga games. Those have me on the verge of quitting games as well. We want to play the games, not see notifications and pop ups about things we already can access elsewhere!!!
December 20th, 2010 at 8:13 am
[...] expertise at working the Facebook platform. Another factor that appears to be helping it is the re-introduction of third-party notifications to the top menu bar earlier this [...]
December 20th, 2010 at 8:44 am
one more… I HATE IT> MAKE IT GO AWAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
December 20th, 2010 at 12:54 pm
I agree with Hope: I HATE IT> MAKE IT GO AWAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
December 20th, 2010 at 3:43 pm
I hate it! I hate it! I hate it! Why would anyone want a notification about game request is beyond me. You are bound to see it without this annoyance.
Please make it stop! I’m a on a verge of blocking all the apps. Try and explain losing customers over some unneeded and unwanted feature that can’t be disabled to the game developers.
December 21st, 2010 at 11:01 am
I am getting requests for Crime City, CityVille, Zoo World — I don’t even PLAY these games.
Can you idiots please give us a nice Christmas present and REMOVE THIS FEATURE? Or at least allow us to block it or the individual game requests?
THANKS
December 21st, 2010 at 7:46 pm
Horrible idea!!!! My phone is going off a million times a day because of these stupid game notifications. I’m disabling all games and will never look at them again!!
December 22nd, 2010 at 8:06 am
This TOTALLY sucks. It’s so annoying! Facebook needs to give us an option to turn that crap off!
December 22nd, 2010 at 12:30 pm
This is a horrible, horrible thing to do, adding game requests to the notification system! please stop it! Give us the option to turn it off, but NOBODY likes it though so just get rid of it! Multiple redundancies are NOT a good thing, especially when one of them is also the SOLE way to see who’s commented on your status! I am really angry with Facebook right now; I have been on Facebook for 6 years solid and I don’t want to leave but it might be necessary, at least for a while.
What idiots you are lately, Facebook. You couldn’t even take the time to poll the users?
December 24th, 2010 at 6:54 am
[...] and a large international audience. Changes to Facebook’s platform could also be involved; moving third-party requests back to the notification channel could have helped replicate the viral growth that first made Zynga [...]
December 24th, 2010 at 8:26 am
I used to check the on-site notifications specifically to see ONLY who liked or commented on my posts, or posted to my wall. Now, it’s impossible and I am very upset about this! I already now that 20 people have sent me gifts in Farmville, and have already received them! I want it changed back, or turned OFF!
DISLIKE!
December 24th, 2010 at 8:11 pm
PLEASE Facebook, I beg you!!! DON’T MAKE THIS CHANGE PERMANENT!!! I, like many people, like to see what folks are responding to in my posts. It is TOO MUCH to wade through the posts of who sent me a gift under the notifications. Isn’t that what the game requests section is for? If you insist on doing this, can you please give us the option of turning it off? This is like getting spam to me, and I don’t like that.
December 25th, 2010 at 5:51 am
I absolutely detest this feature! I’ll delete all of the games if I’m not able to turn this feature off soon. I’m missing a lot of notifications from friends that I would like to see. They are getting lost in the shuffle with all of these app notifications. It’s very disconcerting.
December 25th, 2010 at 7:38 pm
TURN IT OFF!!! TURN IT OFF!!! TURN IT OFF!!! Words simply cannot express how much I HATE this godawful, moronic, worthless, stupid idea! I get hundreds of notices I care absolutely NOTHING about, and they bury the messages I WANT to get. Whoever thought of this idea should be slapped – by everyone on Facebook. This is horrible.
I’ve tried living with it. I’ve tried adapting to it. It still sucks. I get on Facebook to connect with my family and friends, and this keeps me from knowing when they’re talking to me.
PLEASE MAKE IT STOP.
December 26th, 2010 at 5:39 am
Can this be stopped please?! I find it very annoying. It made me delete most of my games already. At least give the users of facebook the possibility to switch it off. I don’t get why the developers still keep this running (without the possibility of switching it off), when there are so many people who dislike this. Arrogant much?
December 27th, 2010 at 9:50 am
Tell the Developers the LOVE that users do not LOVE this.
I will finally and forever stop playing any applications on FB if this is how it’s going to work. I can’t find notification from my children and my other family and friends.
Yes you ARE arrogant.
December 28th, 2010 at 11:35 am
I’m so pissed. I’ve been trying to figure out for days how to get rid of the stupid game notifications only to find out you can’t. It’s so annoying! I’m happy when I get notifications from friends about things I posted/commented but now I just get annoyed because game notifications are taking up most of the space. Please take this sh*t out.
December 28th, 2010 at 11:56 pm
These notifications are VERY VERY annoying, I am also considering quitting the games because of them, I used to LOVE to get notifications, it meant that someone was communicating with me which is what I thought this site was about!! Social networking, not a gamers forum. Please Please stop the notifications or at least give us a way to disable them.
December 31st, 2010 at 9:15 am
I like to play the games, but am about to delete all the games because of this. I get all my game notifications in the side bar…I want the notifications to be about a friend communicating with me. Why do I need the game notifications in two places?????? I am missing important notifications from family and friends because of the scroll/spam from the games. Hate it, hate it, hate it and will be deleting all games if this is not changed.
Also, I hate how they now post what you say on everyone else’s pictures and walls for all your friends to see on -your- wall. I notice that when I delete them now, facebook gives a pop-up that I have to click every single time (annoying) asking if I understand that people will only be able to see the message if they can see the picture I posted the comment to….doesn’t really help when ‘joe’, the friend whose picture I commented on, has everything public, so my conservative ‘aunt mary’ can see my liberal comment on the photo….when before this change, ‘aunt mary’ would have never seen it and had no reason to search or look at ‘joe’s’ public page.
January 1st, 2011 at 7:01 pm
Just likw my friends, I too removed FarmVille and CafeWorld..What a relief. No unwanted notifications. Sorry Zynga..
January 2nd, 2011 at 1:02 pm
This is such a horror. Please, please turn it off. I have blocked everything I can think of and still I get ridiculous notifications constantly. There is absolutely no reason to immediately be notified about events that I will see when I CHOOSE to. The most important thing in today’s economy is human attention. You’ve lost mine. All the apps I’ve now blocked have lost mine. All the potential new games I might have played have now lost, as I’ve blocked them all. There is no upside to this.
January 3rd, 2011 at 2:33 pm
I am getting very frustrated with this and delete my apps when I sign off so I don’t get thousands of these notifications when I log back in. I cannot wait until they let us remve this. I no longer get excited to see a notification pop up and miss comments from my friends b/c there are so many others I can’t see the ones I care about. Pretty soon, I am just going to not reinstall the apps at all. THIS IS A FRIEND NETWORKING SITE WITH GAMES ON THE SIDE NOT A GAMING SITE WITH FRIENDS ON THE SIDE!!
January 4th, 2011 at 7:37 am
Agree with all of the above
January 7th, 2011 at 8:59 pm
I was very disappointed to find out we can’t turn these irritating request application notifications off. Take them off. I hate them.
January 8th, 2011 at 7:25 am
look here facebook all i want to know is how i can block application request in the first place i dont want to get rid of them i just want the invites to stop find a way to do this or i am gone
January 8th, 2011 at 3:30 pm
Is there any way to see the full friends list who sent u gifts on one aplication?
I have this message, on the “your notification” page:
“friend_y, friend_z, and xxx other friends sent you requests in aplication_name.”
But when i click there the pop-up window only shows 22 names, it has to be a way to see them all!!
January 8th, 2011 at 11:03 pm
I have searched and searched the Facebook site and there is NO WAY to stop these horrid things from appearing. To make matters even more fun Facebook has apparently made it more difficult to contact them. I remember as recent as July 2010, you could post in Facebook forums for the ‘official’ Facebook page. I checked the same page back in December, and guess what? You can no longer create new posts in the forum there. In fact, there is no forum at all. Lovely, Facebook. Just lovely. Where are the millions of dollars going—to pay idiots to figure out how to annoy users? If so they are certainly earning their pay with this stupid crap.
January 10th, 2011 at 3:01 pm
Horrible, HORRIBLE idea. Ever since this has been in effect I’ve been looking for a way to turn this off. I don’t need to be notified of game requests. I check it a couple of times a day anyway. And it’s cluttering up notifications of the things that are actually important.
January 10th, 2011 at 8:54 pm
Worst test ever! I have never been more annoyed at Facebook. I am considering deleting every game from my page, but I keep hoping Facebook will fix this mess so I don’t have to lose all of the progress I’ve made in the couple of games that I play. I’ve deleted all of the other games that I only played occasionally and helped people with gifts in because it was getting to the point that I missed ACTUAL notifications from my friends. It’s absolutely ridiculous that they haven’t just put up a column next to the options for email notifications that’s for whether you receive notifications for these apps at all. I can’t believe it is taking them this long to get on top of things and realize what the people want.
January 15th, 2011 at 9:11 am
are they still testing this crap?! FUCK!
January 19th, 2011 at 5:07 am
Remove, remove, remove. Idiots!
January 20th, 2011 at 9:59 pm
[...] during Cityville launch:FB coincidentally started testing/rolling out requests in notifications. http://www.insidefacebook.com/20…. Weird to think that FB started rolling out this change exactly when Cityville was launched.There [...]
January 22nd, 2011 at 3:16 pm
Removed and blocked 90% of the apps I used as a result. The only one I kept is only being kept temporarily to determine when this garbage “feature” stops.
January 24th, 2011 at 6:26 pm
I hate it with the firey passion of a thousand blazing suns!
January 26th, 2011 at 1:21 pm
Make it stop!!!!! I’m going to give it a week and if this test isn’t over, or we have no option of disabling the notifications.. I will block all the games.
With this many people complaining.. you’d think they’d stop the test already.. trying to get people to notice the games.. all this is going to do is get people to block them!
January 28th, 2011 at 7:34 am
I cant believe the guys are so retarded as to put this in without an option to turn it off.
January 31st, 2011 at 11:23 am
Add my name to the list of people who think this is about the lamest thing Facebook has ever done. I spent a long time trying to figure out how to keep the game requests from showing up in my notifications. Seems there is no option for that. I play the Zynga games, and you need to have the game requests to advance in the games but the “requests” section on the right side is way more than enough. I am wayyyy getting “request” fatigue! I can’t tell you how many of my friend’s comments to my posts, etc. that I have missed because of the bombardment of the game requests in my notification area. I am seriously considering deleting ALL the games that I play, because of the MASSIVE frustration I am feeling. So, I guess that means I will spend only a couple of minutes on Facebook instead of the hours I spend there now. Great marketing move Facebook “geniuses” This could be a study in “How to Ruin Your Online Social Network In One Easy Lesson”
January 31st, 2011 at 7:15 pm
WORST FEATURE EVER! Not only has it rendered notifications on FB useless, but it also rendered mobile notifications useless. I’ve removed almost all apps and about to remove the last ones if this does not go away soon.
February 7th, 2011 at 6:44 pm
COME ON ALREADY!!!!!!! 2 months in NOT a “short term test”. Turn this stupid crap off! The only thing your stupidity in performing this test has done is make people IGNORE the notification you were trying to get them to pay more attention to. I used to log on to 4 or 5 notifications and now I have 50+ an hour! I never even look at them anymore, I just click and and click again to make the number go away.
February 12th, 2011 at 5:08 pm
It is obvious that this test was an epic fail when I scroll down and I just read negative comment after negative comment. I can’t understand for the life of me why Facebook would keep this up if it’s clearly upsetting people. There’s no question about it, it’s AWFUL. It needs to stop. Logging on everyday and clicking up at my notifications to find I only got farmville requests is rather disappointing. Important things should appear up there, not redundant things like a stupid game. And while I’m on facebook I constantly keep getting new red little notifications popping up and it’s just way too distracting. STOP IT!