Some of you guys might recall that very early on in Facebook’s life, there existed a “poke” feature, which basically lets you “poke” your friends to get their attention. That person in return can poke you back, and this would basically go back and forth until one person gets sick of it. We’re not sure if it served a bigger purpose, but Facebook wants to bring it back.
Note that the feature has never really gone away, but it isn’t quite as obvious, but that’s what Facebook wants to change. In the screenshot to the right, you can see that Facebook is now making the poking feature considerably more obvious in its placement and location. However it seems that the poke is just the start of things.
According to TNW, they have discovered that Facebook is also testing out other methods of getting a user’s attention through the form of greetings. Just like how the “Like” button expanded to cover a range of emotions, the poke feature will also be expanding into various forms of greetings, such as hugging, winking, high-fiving, and so on.
Facebook has got a bunch of new Reaction buttons for ‘Greetings’ pic.twitter.com/FMiH7e0m5B
— Matt Navarra (@MattNavarra) December 6, 2017
Like we said, we’re not sure what the poke was trying to accomplish back then, so it is unclear what these greetings will accomplish either. However back in the day, Facebook explained, “When we created the poke, we thought it would be cool to have a feature without any specific purpose. People interpret the poke in many different ways, and we encourage you to come up with your own meanings.”
Image credit – TechCrunch
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