Facebook has announced a new Subscribe button that will make it easier to keep up with people you’re interested in but might not know personally. The feature is scheduled to roll out over the next few days, according to a post on the Facebook blog.
The blog post describes the multifaceted feature as a way to choose what you see in your news feed, hear from individuals you aren’t friends with and vice-versa. This is basically the same model that Google+ and Twitter use.
When choosing what you see in your news feed, you can now select how often you want to be updated on a friend’s status. Options here include all updates, most updates (the amount you’d normally see) or important updates, which will highlight big things like a job change or relocating.
Additionally you can adjust the types of updates you wish to see, such as photos only from certain friends or excluding game updates from another. These are all optional and if you don’t want to fine-tune what you see, simply ignore the feature.
The Subscribe button works both ways, meaning you can set up the feature on your profile to allow others to follow your updates without having to first be your friend. Users that subscribe to your feed will only be able to see updates that you mark as Public and you can further limit who can comment on your posts and what notifications you will receive. This is a completely optional feature and you must opt-in to enable it.
To enable the Subscribe button on your profile, head over to the Subscribe button page and click Allow Subscribers to get started.
