Facebook Questions Has Now Launched

Back in February (more than a few weeks ago) I wrote a post saying Facebook Questions will be released in a few weeks, unfortunately, it was a bit longer than that. However, that is all the past now as Facebook Questions have been launched.

You will now see an option to post a new question next where you would write a status update. It’s quite simple to use, and you have the option of creating a poll, which can be extremely useful. However, you might also want to un-tick the “Allow anyone to add options” as shown in the screenshot below, you don’t really want your question to be spammed. Who knows what viral questions will be produced by the Facebook community, because I am sure millions of us will see the same question, just like millions of us suffered in pain with the Rebecca Black Friday song.

When you post a question, you will be told that when you ask a question, it will be viewable to everyone, and friends can share it with their friends and so on. So if you want to ask personal questions, I wouldn’t. It is no surprise that Facebook didn’t add an option to allow you to post private polls that only your close friends can answer.

When one of your friends responds to a poll, you will see something like the below appear. As you can see, this is the same question as above, but it shows their are 97 more options to choose from – which will probably grow more.

You will also see a “Ask friends” link at the end of the question or poll, and you can ask any of your friends to answer it by just selecting their name.

My Thoughts About Facebook Questions

My first reaction was “wow” I think it may be quite useful. But as I explore the functionality in detail, I think trolls will emerge and start spamming questions.

Do I thing it will kill other answer services such as Yahoo Answers or Quora? I am not sure. But I do think it provides a quick and easy way to crowd source information. I am unsure if the Facebook community will write quick questions with quick responses, or long answers to questions. We will just have to see how it goes.

Within a small group of friends I think Facebook questions will do really well, but if it becomes popular and a lot of people respond, then I don’t think it will be as great because your questions may be hijacked – especially if you leave the add options button ticked.

The other thing that concerns me is privacy. If you ask a question, it’s public to everyone – so it’s a way people can read what you are up to (well at least the questions you ask). I suggest to everyone to be careful on the questions you respond to (and what you answer with) because anyone can read them.

So that is a very brief insight on how the new Facebook Questions work, and some of my opinions on it. Have you used it yet? What are your thoughts?

For more information about Facebook Questions, visit the Facebook Questions page.