Facebook: Out with “Subscribing,” in with “Following”

Apparently, Facebook wasn’t happy with the adoption of their “subscribe” feature, which allows users to subscribe to the updates of public figures (and non-celebs, to a certain extent, if they have the option enabled). For those of you who subscribe to people on the site, don’t worry – Facebook isn’t axing it. They’re simply giving it a name makeover.

Starting today, Facebook is doing away with the “subscribe” button and replacing it with the “follow” button. The new follow button will work exactly like the old subscribe button. Absolutely nothing is changing, according to Facebook:

Starting today we are updating the term “Subscribe” to become “Follow” across the site as we found it is a term that resonates better with people on the service. Nothing is changing about how the feature works.

Out with subscribing, in with following. This change-in-name-only will be rolling out across the site, and will also affect the subscribe buttons that some people have put on their websites.

Facebook first launched subscriptions back in September of 2011 as a way for people to follow others without becoming “friends.” People want to see the Facebook updates of people they don’t personally know – Facebook is right about this. With subscriptions, they made Facebook a little more like Twitter or even Google+ in a way.

Now, with this change in terminology, it’s going to be impossible to use the feature without being reminded of Twitter. And maybe that’s a good thing for Facebook when it comes to getting users to actually use the feature.

[via The Verge]