A woman's Facebook status updates from her mobile phone become a lifeline for her and a group of 36 people traveling in Haiti during the earthquake. A recently laid-off man lands a new job by reaching out to his friends on Facebook. After 15 years apart, a father reconnects with his daughter through Facebook.
These are just a few of the hundreds of stories people like you have shared about their experiences on Facebook. Each of the 500 million people using Facebook, though, has a story. We want to hear your story, too, so it can inspire others to reconnect with long-lost friends, get closer to their friends and family, support those in need, or even start a political movement.
We launched the
Facebook Stories application today to celebrate all these types of stories and to help you share your story with people around the world. You can explore stories on a world map, or sort the stories by dozens of themes like "Love," "Family," Reunions," "Sports" and "College." Fill out the short form at the bottom and select a theme, and you're able to share your story in the application and with your friends through News Feed.
As you read the stories of others, be sure to "Like" your favorites—the ones that make you laugh, smile or cry, for example—and also share them with your Facebook friends. The more "Likes" a story receives, the more likely it is to be featured in an upcoming "Most Popular" section for more people to see.
Stories Everywhere
As well as being available at
http://stories.facebook.com/, Facebook Stories is also highlighted as a tab on the Facebook Pages of 31 partners. The partner Pages chose the default theme to show on their Facebook Stories tab based on the types of stories they want to highlight for their audience. At launch, the following Pages have added tabs with these themes highlighted:
- Causes: Causes, UNICEF and UNICEF USA, and World Wildlife Fund
- Celebrities: Cristiano Ronaldo
- Education: DonorsChoose.org and National PTA
- Government: The White House
- Health: LIVESTRONG.COM
- Love: The Knot
- Military: British Army, U.S. Coast Guard
- Movements: (RED) and U.S. President Barack Obama
- Music: Justin Bieber, Kerrang! Radio, Linkin Park, Spotify, U2, The X Factor
- Natural Disasters: American Red Cross
- Peace: Mayor Cory Booker of Newark, N.J.
- Pets: PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) and The Humane Society of the United States
- Politics: Washington Post
- Small Business: Kiva
- Sports: Cricinfo, ESPN, Major League Baseball, PGA TOUR, United States Golf Association and Wimbledon
- Travel: The New York Times
Facebook Stories was developed using the tools and resources of Facebook Platform, which are available to any developer. Our team worked with developers
JESS3, of Washington, D.C., and
Involver, of San Francisco, to create the application. JESS3 handled the visual design, while the application was built on Involver's platform. We also integrated
Bing Maps to power the location view for stories.
On the Road
While Facebook Stories helps anyone tell their story and see the stories of others, it doesn't replace meeting people in person. Later this summer, we're going to do just that.
A team from Facebook will be hitting the open road in the U.S. to meet the people, towns and organizations behind these stories in our first Facebook Stories road trip. We'll be sharing more details of the trip and initial stops in future posts on this
blog and the Facebook Page.
Do you think we should visit your town? Tell us why by sharing your story on
Facebook Stories. Submissions are limited to 420 characters, so think about what makes your story unique and about the impact you or a group of people made by using Facebook.
We're looking forward to hearing all of your stories—and being surprised by the ways people are connecting that we've never imagined.
Elliot, Facebook's vice president of communications and public policy, rediscovered many of his high school friends on Facebook.
No comments:
Post a Comment