Facebook testing Interest Lists

Facebook is testing a new "Interest Lists" feature that allows users to view a filtered version of their News Feed. Facebook users can already create lists to organize their friends, but users have never been able to create lists of Pages. "We are constantly testing new products and features, but we have nothing more to share," a Facebook spokesperson said in a statement.

As you can see in the screenshot above, courtesy of Social Fresh, the feature is available to some from a drop-down menu beneath the cover photo on Pages that switched to Timeline. Users that see the option to "Add to Interests Lists" are told they can click the "New List…" button to "Start an interest list to see a special news feed of related posts."

It's worth noting how similar the feature is to Twitter Lists. Ever since Facebook launched Subscriptions, the social networking giant has been offering more and more features that mimic how Twitter functions (see links below).

As Facebook users Like more Pages and Subscribe to more public figures, a feature like Interest Lists makes sense. Unfortunately, if Interest Lists won't let you include subscriptions and friends in addition to Pages, I fear it will be rarely used. Interest Lists should definitely let you include subscriptions as well, but I'm not so sure about friends.

To gain maximum popularity, Interest Lists should be publicly shareable, assuming they only feature what anyone can add to their News Feed. If a list includes your Pages, subscriptions, and friends, however, I would assume Facebook will make sure you can't share it publicly. This is assuming Facebook completely follows Twitter (pun intended), which has lists that can be public or private.

I would argue Facebook will keep Friend Lists separate from Interest lists, and make sure the latter is either limited to just Pages or just Pages and subscriptions. The company will also likely make suggestions when you're building or using a list. If you Like a band, maybe you want to subscribe to one or more of its members? If you Like a company, maybe you want to subscribe to its CEO's updates. If you Like a sports team, maybe you want to subscribe to its star player's updates?

See also:

• Facebook launches Subscriptions, similar to Twitter following
• Facebook now lets you update Twitter
• Facebook launches Subscribe button for websites
• Facebook launches verified accounts, pseudonyms
• Facebook: 1000s of journalists are already using Subscribe
• The rich flock to Facebook, don't bother with Twitter