Facebook returns to its roots

Platform again showing posts from friends and family

- MIKE ISAAC

Last year, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Tom Alison, one of his top lieutenants, were discussing how they wanted to reshape Facebook for the future of social networking.

Zuckerberg, who had grown Facebook from a dorm-room project to a US$1.5 trillion company that he renamed Meta, wanted to bring back some of the original rationale for the social network, or what he called "OG Facebook" vibes, Alison said in an interview. After years of adding features, the executives felt that some of Facebook's key functions were being drowned out.

So they asked themselves: Why not try building some features that resembled the Facebook of yore a bit more?

Last Thursday, Meta did just that with a simple tweak. The company said the Facebook app would now include a separate news feed for users that featured posts shared exclusively by people's friends and family.