Facebook to filter News Feed of ‘spammy’ content

Facebook is looking to serve its users better, with the introduction of a new scheme to filter its News Feed so that 'spammy' content could be considerably reduced, if not totally gotten rid of.

In a recent move the website unveiled a series of improvements aimed at cutting down the number of those frequently-complained-about News Feed posts. That content is mostly published by the site's "Pages" feature, which deliberately tries to find greater distribution.

With the latest update, the social network is looking to target three main categories that tapped unsolicited behaviour. These were 'like-baiting,' spammy links, and frequently circulated content and that way Facebook aimed to deliver only the right content to the right people within the right time.

To set the process in motion, the online site is initially cracking down on "Like"-baiting, which is the  practice wherein posts explicitly ask its readers to either like, comment, or share the messages in order to obtain additional distribution.

According to studies most users took action based on those posts but they often found those messages less relevant compared to some other stories in their News Feeds.

It had been highlighted through analysis that over time, most users found stories of the type less enjoyable especially as these might drown out other important content that actually came from users' friends and from Pages itself.

According to Facebook, users had been complaining about the kind of spam feeds that continued to trickle into their feeds on a daily basis. The social network added that it would be aiming to rid feeds of spam-like behaviour, which it said also includes baiting, overly circulated content and spam links.

Users caught trying to bait other users to like, comment or share their posts in an effort to increase their social media presence would be barred from using the site.

According to Facebook researchers, users believed that such baiting stories and spam were overall at least 15 per cent less relevant than other stories with similar amounts of social interactions and page likes.

Complaints were also there about pages that overly share stories or videos by posting and re-posting the same material. According to Facebook they were attempting to improve on the issue by "de-emphasising" these pages on feeds.

As for the pages that tricked users into visiting an advertisement website claiming to link to a story or a photo album, Facebook's update plans to detect such links based on the number of people who visit those links and if they were sharing or liking those links on their network.