Yes, Sidebar Boxes Will Be Removed From Facebook Pages

Facebook has confirmed that the removal of the boxes tab is a sweeping change that will see the disappearance of all profile boxes on the left-hand side of Facebook Pages.

A Facebook spokeswoman told AllFacebook.com: “These boxes will be removed, just as they will be from profiles, and so the page owners will need to move that info to the info page or a custom tab.”

The changes are to take effect the week commencing August 23, along with a new tab width limit if 520 pixels. However, the Facebook Developer Blog and Developer Roadmap were not explicit on the details, so we asked Facebook for some clarification.

We showed them a few examples and here’s what we found out…

Example 1: On the Coca-Cola fan page, the “House Rules” box on the left-hand panel of the Wall tab will no longer be supported.

Example 2: The privacy policy on the AT&T Facebook page – currently in a box on the left-hand side – will no longer be displayed in its current format.

Example 3: The TOMS Shoes Facebook page will keep the image that says “With every purchase. TOMS will give a pair of new shoes to a child in need. One for one”. A Facebook spokeswoman confirmed that this was in a description area rather than a box and would not be going away. She added that Tom’s also had this information on the “Welcome” tab, which was an FBML tab, and would remain.

Tags:Pages

Inside Social Apps 2012 is Less Than Two Weeks Away

Mediabistro Event

Inside Social Apps, held on February 8-9 in San Francisco, is less than two weeks away. This is the third conference on the future of monetization on social and mobile platforms. Leaders from the industry will share their views on today's most formidable challenges affecting social and mobile apps and games in 2012. Inside Social Apps conferences sell out in advance, so take advantage of early registration pricing. Early bird rates end on February 1, so register today.

1696356 Comments2010-08-11+13%3A54%3A34Caitlin+Fitzsimmons »

This does not make me happy!

Bad for businesses!!!

Come on Facebook!!!!!

Comment by Derek Richardson — August 11, 2010 @ 6:14 am
Actually the last example will be impacted as well when the dimension change to 520 px wide.

Comment by Dustin Nielson — August 11, 2010 @ 6:27 am
What about official boxes like music and video? Surely this will cause problems for musicians pages?

Comment by Jonathan Thompson — August 11, 2010 @ 6:41 am
that just doesnt make sense at all. Why would they take this option away? So important to stay alive!!

Comment by Robert Wagner — August 11, 2010 @ 7:10 am
FB just keeps taking away user features and enhancing ways to market us to death. I personally will jump ship the second google gets their social site ready to go!!!!!

This change has just gone too far.

Comment by Cyn — August 11, 2010 @ 7:15 am
This makes no sense at all. I'd like to know the purpose.

Comment by Eddie Long — August 11, 2010 @ 7:26 am
Real confusing why they would do this

Comment by @phiunit — August 11, 2010 @ 7:30 am
According to http://developers.facebook.com/blog/post/399,

"These updates are designed to simplify navigation for users, reduce complexity for developers, and enable us to build the next generation of tools for growing your business with Facebook. Subscribe to the developer blog to learn about our new roadmap in the coming weeks."

Comment by Adam — August 11, 2010 @ 7:54 am
Not so happy to read this, Caitlin, but good to have this question clarified!

Comment by Bryan Person — August 11, 2010 @ 8:13 am
Very disappointed that we will be losing custom boxes in the left hand columns. It was enough to lose the boxes tab and all that it contained. I'm tiring of facebooks continues changes to fan pages. These changes make it very difficult to provide quality custom fan pages for clients. Looking forward to the open source facebook project Diaspora being ready for Beta some day so I can jump off the Facebook ship.

Comment by Nathan Stephens — August 11, 2010 @ 9:54 am
What will happened to the content that I put there to market and protect myself & my content? I.E. videos, LinkedIn profile link, Creative Commons License. Where will this content go? Will it just vanish?

Comment by Christine Pilch — August 11, 2010 @ 10:10 am
It's a risk we take when we design and resell design services based on another organization. In the case of Facebook, it's a company that is constantly evolving… I hope they don't keep making swift moves that affect so many people and businesses…

Comment by m a r c o — August 11, 2010 @ 10:49 am
Hotels have worked so hard to integrate booking engine widgets into their walls using boxes. Now all of that was a waste. Facebook is starting to turn advertisers away with updates like this.

Comment by Jen Winn — August 11, 2010 @ 11:25 am
Facebook NEVER listens to its users, so I don't know that it does any good to complain. That said… I love having those boxes along the side of my profile showing what music I like and what books I've read, and I love seeing them on other people's profiles as well. It helps me to know them better. I have yet to hear Facebook's folks explain how removing those boxes is going to make life any better for the users. It's like when they altered the way the profiles are shown so you could link to actual pages for the products, and we had to re-enter everything we wanted listed — and then half of it didn't link to anything else anyway. To borrow a phrase from Joseph Heller's book "Good as Gold," it seems like when it comes to Facebook, "Every change is for the worse."

Comment by Craig Pittman — August 11, 2010 @ 11:34 am
"A Facebook spokeswoman told AllFacebook.com: “These boxes will be removed, just as they will be from profiles, and so the page owners will need to move that info to the info page or a custom tab"

Move to the info page? is there room? It looks like what we have to go is go back to the FBML app and select display as Tab? do we need to do this for all the box work already done or is Facepalmbook going to do this for us?

Comment by dg — August 11, 2010 @ 2:28 pm
So, what are we supposed to do with the content currently in boxes that we don't want to lose? Do we have to create a new Static FBML tab for each one? Will the Static FBML application still be usable?

Comment by Tara Alemany — August 11, 2010 @ 2:36 pm
Facebook is driving me crazy. Never build your business model around Facebook.

Comment by Tyson Miller — August 11, 2010 @ 3:04 pm
Your last Tom example shows the wrong screenshot. You are referencing the wall and show a welcome tab

Comment by Michael Stelzner — August 12, 2010 @ 4:40 am
Well at least this confirms that I am not crazy. I was having trouble explaining why I still had left sidebars on my older pages, but could not get them working on my newer pages. I had a feeling that the side bar function was in transit.

That said: I HATE it. I am usually one person who does not bemoan every chcnge that Facebook makes and every hiccup in their delivery, but this one.. as part of an organization that runs a whole slew of pages for clients and brands, they just made it that much harder to brand a page and make it functional for our clients and, in the end, other Facebook users.

Just as their contest runs benefited partnered third parties such as Wildfire, I have a feeling that this change benefits partnered template manaufactures.

Sad. Just sad and bad games on behalf of Facebook. They really DO think they are God.

Comment by Claudia Corrigan D&# — August 12, 2010 @ 5:14 am
One particular downside of this is the loss of the Linkedin Profile Button which is on thousands of users' profiles and pages. Now, it's just lost in the row of other tabs. I just wished Facebook and Linkedin got together to find a permanent solution to this and many other essential social links.

Comment by Robert G Boulay — August 12, 2010 @ 6:16 am
Facebook is limiting users and brands more each day and offering many of these customizations now for a HIGH price. A brand must have a huge media buy in order to be able to do what they want now and it will only get worse. I understand FB has to monetize somehow but do it in new ways, stop taking away these features. Ridiculous.

Comment by Kate — August 12, 2010 @ 7:10 am
Sometimes you can simplify things too much and then they look stupid.

Comment by pfwd — August 12, 2010 @ 11:09 am
What a disappointing news. Facebook really is driving advertisers and brands away with changes like these. Brands invest great sums of money into advertising their facebook pages and facebook responds with limiting space available for branding. Silly.

Comment by Michal Konicek — August 12, 2010 @ 4:18 pm
Thinking seriously of setting up LinkedIn, concentrating on that, and leaving FB to personal stuff. I'm just tired of the changes that, IMO, do not make anything better for the users.

Comment by Pam — August 12, 2010 @ 7:11 pm
The resizing to 520 is completely ridiculous. in a world where monitor sizes are getting bigger they're shrinking the space. not to mention the fact that we're going to have to recode all of the custom fan pages we've ever done.

Thanks again Mark. spend less time on your movie and more time with your site. :p

Comment by adrian — August 13, 2010 @ 6:45 am
This extremly reduces the functionality of custom fan pages and with no real explanation. And to not give designers more time to recode their clients pages is a huge slap in the face.

Comment by Socialnet Evolution — August 13, 2010 @ 11:50 am
So does this mean that the music player and the discography Facebook apps that are used on band pages will disappear when the boxes are gone?

Right now there doesn't appear to be the option to move them to a tab other than to the boxes tab.

Comment by beth — August 13, 2010 @ 5:08 pm
facebook doesn't CARE AT ALL! they're just like an airline- they keep taking away the stuff we enjoy. i dont understand why they're taking away the most important part of the profiles. i'm leaving facebook if they dont bring back the boxes (and btw i created a page called "Bring back the boxes facebook"), b/c this is just too much. i guess it'stime for facebook to say sayonara to it's 500 million members.

Comment by Gabi — August 14, 2010 @ 3:47 pm
People say that change is for the better, crap. This is supposed to be a democratic place, and as such we should vote with our feet. I will be leaving as soon as the new google social site is up and running. I will lose all my zoo friends and a game that that I enjoy, but that is the price that facebook will pay for not listening to the people who matter.

Comment by Iain — August 15, 2010 @ 2:51 am
Facebook owner, you are constantly doing things to make facebook more and more so f*ed up that I have for along time weighed my options of going back to myspace…..I use to love facebook, as it was a great place but you keep taking away, and limiting our postings, and being the greedy asshole that you are, keep on and you won't have a site anymore..People put their trust into your site and you continue to take away from the services you force the gaming industry to give you proceeds of the money their games because their games are so profitable, you can't stand it…Don't you have enough money????Just another face of corporate bullshit, taking and never giving back….You don't care about the users, you never have….Just line your pockets…..Good luck when you start losing your users. I will be laughing when people go back to Myspace, there were no loopholes there…..See ya Mark…..

Comment by Linda — August 15, 2010 @ 7:04 am
The side boxes are really the only thing that makes your wall page colorful. Otherwise, it is boring white. Boring, Boring, Boring, Boring, Boring.

Comment by Lynn Strauch — August 15, 2010 @ 7:42 am
A lot of Facebook pages will have to wait until next monday to see what are the changes really. I still cannot imagine how..

Comment by Adlan Khalidi — August 19, 2010 @ 9:00 pm
So what's the difference between a "description area" and a box (per example #3)?

Comment by Rachel Melville — August 20, 2010 @ 12:15 pm
boo *eff-word*'en boo!!!!!!!

Comment by michael g — August 24, 2010 @ 9:50 pm
I have spent many hours designing Facebook pages for my clients using the sidebar. You're going to erase it all just because you want to make a change? Does this mean no FBML tabs on sidebars too? What's the point of having an FB page if we can't make it our own?

Comment by Tara Benwell — August 25, 2010 @ 12:02 pm
I'm going to be going against the flow here. First, I also hate the idea that the profile box is going away.

However, I don't think it's the end of the world.

I believe smart facebook page owners would be thinking about building an application to replace their page. That allows you to have MUCH more interesting pages.

Don't abandon ship just yet, because with a bit of lateral thinking, there's some really exciting options available on Facebook.

Comment by Michael Phipps — August 26, 2010 @ 2:55 am
So…I still see these boxes on several pages including the examples listed above. Is this still happening? Are certain pages "grand-fathered" in and therefore exempt?

Can anyone give me an update?

Comment by Zenneia — September 3, 2010 @ 12:06 pm
Does this include the custom facebook sidebars that some people have made with their photo and biz logo? Or will that be able to stay in the photo section of your profile?

I really hate all the changes FB keeps making, sweeping away features that so many of us like. PLUS their process to proof your identity if they suspect you have malware on your computer – sheesh, it's insane.

Some other smart social media is gonna take over and we'll all move to that. Looks to me like FB just wants to clear more space for paid advertisers to have ads on our pages

Comment by Evelyn Roberts Brook — September 3, 2010 @ 5:15 pm
Evelyn hit the big nail squarely on its greedy head. Facebook is taking the boxes away so that advertisers can place ads there. Why limit ads to just the right side? They are making a killing on those ads.

In no time, we will see that bottom left area with ads. They may be cheaper than the right margin ads since they will be lower on the page, but they will be there. There is ZERO reason to get rid of the boxes and keep the space blank.

And adding what's in the boxes to the tabs is meaningless. People are not going to use the tabs to a large extent. Too much work.

Both Google and Facebook continually make changes that are unpopular for users but profitable for them. Never rely on any greedy Internet presence for anything. If you are not paying for it, don't count on it. And even if you pay, these sites have a TOS that allows them to take your children if they so decide.

Do not build your business model on them.

Comment by Sam — September 5, 2010 @ 2:32 pm
In the road map, Facebook said “boxes on profiles and Pages, and application info sections will be going away”

but still i can see it on below fan pages
http://www.facebook.com/cocacola?v=wall&__a=7&
House Rules

http://www.facebook.com/ATT?v=wall
Txtng Can Wait

can’t sure removed or not… ?

Comment by Prakash Paghdal — September 6, 2010 @ 4:31 am
Very disappointing! Just went through the process of switching from a group to a fan page, mainly because of added sidebar features. These boxes allow us to better customize our pages. Too bad, don't really understand the purpose.

Comment by Neil — September 8, 2010 @ 8:16 am
The boxes were not removed, they are just frozen. Can they be totally removed?

Comment by Becky — September 22, 2010 @ 12:26 pm
no wonder people don't like facebook anymore. Sick of all the changes! GET IT TOGETHER!

Comment by Sarah — September 26, 2010 @ 12:55 pm
this is just like myspace ; trying to get better , when it just really ruined it . Ughh , thats messed up .

Comment by mckayla morales — November 27, 2010 @ 11:20 pm
The rich color palette for UGG classic tall enables people more amazing surprise. As sheepskin can be dyed any color as far as you can imagine

Comment by Moonboots — December 10, 2010 @ 10:44 pm
As far as music goes here is a simple solution you might be interested in people. Yes facebook and myspace has turned to the dogs but you can do as I have and make a quick easy to load myspace page. Post it right on your wall so others can click it to that link and inly on the wall will it go to the myspace page automatically. I tried posting it to the "about me" section and it was pretty much worthless. Means you might have to repost it once in a while to get it back to the top, and might want to just keep your wall clean of other interferences such as posts, convos and other things not posted to your home page but it will work, heres my wall so you can see what i mean – http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1397995337 – and once you click on the -Musicpanel Dejay (music/panel) on Myspace- on my wall it will take you to my page. Yes it is linking MYSPACE in with FACEBOOK but at least you will have players. Keep in mind my players are not standard but you sould still be able to work with friendster the same way. I hope you see this as helpful

Comment by nintynine_waystodie — January 14, 2011 @ 2:30 am
Trust me MYSPACE is so far down the crapper is dont know if theres any saving it after 3.0, Im an avid fan but its no longer worth the pixels it takes to make a computer monitor. Sense the changover they forced my page wont even work. My main page mind you and my secondary i use to link with other links to get players through them barely does. I agree the new facebook page sucks but at least it functions. DO NOT go back to myspace until 3.0 finally gets realized to be the trainwreck it is and they find a good alternative. If you think this is bad myspace is 10 times worse right now.

Comment by nintynine_waystodie — January 14, 2011 @ 2:36 am
Now Facebook's sidebar boxes has been replaced to a million dollar worth ads..

Comment by xave — January 27, 2011 @ 3:20 pm
What is the point in having a band page on Facebook if your fans can't even list to your music???????

Comment by Greg — February 24, 2011 @ 12:52 am
Not a problem! Just get yourself a facebook sidebar. We do them at http://www.digital-stationery.co.uk/

Comment by @BigDogStudioX — March 1, 2011 @ 4:32 am
I miss the old profile boxes. I can't get them back??

Comment by Bailey — April 26, 2011 @ 9:40 am
I couldnt "effing" agree more. FB treats us all like plebs.

Comment by Barry B — June 28, 2011 @ 12:17 pm
Some people might like it, but i dont its annoying me. How can i take it down? If thats possible.

Comment by Destiny — July 7, 2011 @ 9:37 pm
i wish the chat sidebar will be removed too :3

Comment by Joselyn Yu — July 18, 2011 @ 1:18 am
I know right?!! The old facebook was better! they should have a voting poll or whatnot to ask us if we like something before throwng it out there and f***king everything upppp!!

Comment by jacke — July 18, 2011 @ 3:44 pm
Are facebook sidebars office addons some facebook? Are they safe, can they see login & password info? Concerns me about the amount of data facebook have let alone having things routed thru third parties.

Comment by Martin Phipps — September 19, 2011 @ 4:45 am

RSS feed for comments on this post. TrackBack URL

This does not make me happy!

Bad for businesses!!!

Come on Facebook!!!!!

Comment by Derek Richardson — August 11, 2010 @ 6:14 am

Actually the last example will be impacted as well when the dimension change to 520 px wide.

Comment by Dustin Nielson — August 11, 2010 @ 6:27 am

What about official boxes like music and video? Surely this will cause problems for musicians pages?

Comment by Jonathan Thompson — August 11, 2010 @ 6:41 am

that just doesnt make sense at all. Why would they take this option away? So important to stay alive!!

Comment by Robert Wagner — August 11, 2010 @ 7:10 am

FB just keeps taking away user features and enhancing ways to market us to death. I personally will jump ship the second google gets their social site ready to go!!!!!

This change has just gone too far.

Comment by Cyn — August 11, 2010 @ 7:15 am

This makes no sense at all. I'd like to know the purpose.

Comment by Eddie Long — August 11, 2010 @ 7:26 am

Real confusing why they would do this

Comment by @phiunit — August 11, 2010 @ 7:30 am

According to http://developers.facebook.com/blog/post/399,

"These updates are designed to simplify navigation for users, reduce complexity for developers, and enable us to build the next generation of tools for growing your business with Facebook. Subscribe to the developer blog to learn about our new roadmap in the coming weeks."

Comment by Adam — August 11, 2010 @ 7:54 am

Not so happy to read this, Caitlin, but good to have this question clarified!

Comment by Bryan Person — August 11, 2010 @ 8:13 am

Very disappointed that we will be losing custom boxes in the left hand columns. It was enough to lose the boxes tab and all that it contained. I'm tiring of facebooks continues changes to fan pages. These changes make it very difficult to provide quality custom fan pages for clients. Looking forward to the open source facebook project Diaspora being ready for Beta some day so I can jump off the Facebook ship.

Comment by Nathan Stephens — August 11, 2010 @ 9:54 am

What will happened to the content that I put there to market and protect myself & my content? I.E. videos, LinkedIn profile link, Creative Commons License. Where will this content go? Will it just vanish?

Comment by Christine Pilch — August 11, 2010 @ 10:10 am

It's a risk we take when we design and resell design services based on another organization. In the case of Facebook, it's a company that is constantly evolving… I hope they don't keep making swift moves that affect so many people and businesses…

Comment by m a r c o — August 11, 2010 @ 10:49 am

Hotels have worked so hard to integrate booking engine widgets into their walls using boxes. Now all of that was a waste. Facebook is starting to turn advertisers away with updates like this.

Comment by Jen Winn — August 11, 2010 @ 11:25 am

Facebook NEVER listens to its users, so I don't know that it does any good to complain. That said… I love having those boxes along the side of my profile showing what music I like and what books I've read, and I love seeing them on other people's profiles as well. It helps me to know them better. I have yet to hear Facebook's folks explain how removing those boxes is going to make life any better for the users. It's like when they altered the way the profiles are shown so you could link to actual pages for the products, and we had to re-enter everything we wanted listed — and then half of it didn't link to anything else anyway. To borrow a phrase from Joseph Heller's book "Good as Gold," it seems like when it comes to Facebook, "Every change is for the worse."

Comment by Craig Pittman — August 11, 2010 @ 11:34 am

"A Facebook spokeswoman told AllFacebook.com: “These boxes will be removed, just as they will be from profiles, and so the page owners will need to move that info to the info page or a custom tab"

Move to the info page? is there room? It looks like what we have to go is go back to the FBML app and select display as Tab? do we need to do this for all the box work already done or is Facepalmbook going to do this for us?

Comment by dg — August 11, 2010 @ 2:28 pm

So, what are we supposed to do with the content currently in boxes that we don't want to lose? Do we have to create a new Static FBML tab for each one? Will the Static FBML application still be usable?

Comment by Tara Alemany — August 11, 2010 @ 2:36 pm

Facebook is driving me crazy. Never build your business model around Facebook.

Comment by Tyson Miller — August 11, 2010 @ 3:04 pm

Your last Tom example shows the wrong screenshot. You are referencing the wall and show a welcome tab

Comment by Michael Stelzner — August 12, 2010 @ 4:40 am

Well at least this confirms that I am not crazy. I was having trouble explaining why I still had left sidebars on my older pages, but could not get them working on my newer pages. I had a feeling that the side bar function was in transit.

That said: I HATE it. I am usually one person who does not bemoan every chcnge that Facebook makes and every hiccup in their delivery, but this one.. as part of an organization that runs a whole slew of pages for clients and brands, they just made it that much harder to brand a page and make it functional for our clients and, in the end, other Facebook users.

Just as their contest runs benefited partnered third parties such as Wildfire, I have a feeling that this change benefits partnered template manaufactures.

Sad. Just sad and bad games on behalf of Facebook. They really DO think they are God.

Comment by Claudia Corrigan D&# — August 12, 2010 @ 5:14 am

One particular downside of this is the loss of the Linkedin Profile Button which is on thousands of users' profiles and pages. Now, it's just lost in the row of other tabs. I just wished Facebook and Linkedin got together to find a permanent solution to this and many other essential social links.

Comment by Robert G Boulay — August 12, 2010 @ 6:16 am

Facebook is limiting users and brands more each day and offering many of these customizations now for a HIGH price. A brand must have a huge media buy in order to be able to do what they want now and it will only get worse. I understand FB has to monetize somehow but do it in new ways, stop taking away these features. Ridiculous.

Comment by Kate — August 12, 2010 @ 7:10 am

Sometimes you can simplify things too much and then they look stupid.

Comment by pfwd — August 12, 2010 @ 11:09 am

What a disappointing news. Facebook really is driving advertisers and brands away with changes like these. Brands invest great sums of money into advertising their facebook pages and facebook responds with limiting space available for branding. Silly.

Comment by Michal Konicek — August 12, 2010 @ 4:18 pm

Thinking seriously of setting up LinkedIn, concentrating on that, and leaving FB to personal stuff. I'm just tired of the changes that, IMO, do not make anything better for the users.

Comment by Pam — August 12, 2010 @ 7:11 pm

The resizing to 520 is completely ridiculous. in a world where monitor sizes are getting bigger they're shrinking the space. not to mention the fact that we're going to have to recode all of the custom fan pages we've ever done.

Thanks again Mark. spend less time on your movie and more time with your site. :p

Comment by adrian — August 13, 2010 @ 6:45 am

This extremly reduces the functionality of custom fan pages and with no real explanation. And to not give designers more time to recode their clients pages is a huge slap in the face.

Comment by Socialnet Evolution — August 13, 2010 @ 11:50 am

So does this mean that the music player and the discography Facebook apps that are used on band pages will disappear when the boxes are gone?

Right now there doesn't appear to be the option to move them to a tab other than to the boxes tab.

Comment by beth — August 13, 2010 @ 5:08 pm

facebook doesn't CARE AT ALL! they're just like an airline- they keep taking away the stuff we enjoy. i dont understand why they're taking away the most important part of the profiles. i'm leaving facebook if they dont bring back the boxes (and btw i created a page called "Bring back the boxes facebook"), b/c this is just too much. i guess it'stime for facebook to say sayonara to it's 500 million members.

Comment by Gabi — August 14, 2010 @ 3:47 pm

People say that change is for the better, crap. This is supposed to be a democratic place, and as such we should vote with our feet. I will be leaving as soon as the new google social site is up and running. I will lose all my zoo friends and a game that that I enjoy, but that is the price that facebook will pay for not listening to the people who matter.

Comment by Iain — August 15, 2010 @ 2:51 am

Facebook owner, you are constantly doing things to make facebook more and more so f*ed up that I have for along time weighed my options of going back to myspace…..I use to love facebook, as it was a great place but you keep taking away, and limiting our postings, and being the greedy asshole that you are, keep on and you won't have a site anymore..People put their trust into your site and you continue to take away from the services you force the gaming industry to give you proceeds of the money their games because their games are so profitable, you can't stand it…Don't you have enough money????Just another face of corporate bullshit, taking and never giving back….You don't care about the users, you never have….Just line your pockets…..Good luck when you start losing your users. I will be laughing when people go back to Myspace, there were no loopholes there…..See ya Mark…..

Comment by Linda — August 15, 2010 @ 7:04 am

The side boxes are really the only thing that makes your wall page colorful. Otherwise, it is boring white. Boring, Boring, Boring, Boring, Boring.

Comment by Lynn Strauch — August 15, 2010 @ 7:42 am

A lot of Facebook pages will have to wait until next monday to see what are the changes really. I still cannot imagine how..

Comment by Adlan Khalidi — August 19, 2010 @ 9:00 pm

So what's the difference between a "description area" and a box (per example #3)?

Comment by Rachel Melville — August 20, 2010 @ 12:15 pm

boo *eff-word*'en boo!!!!!!!

Comment by michael g — August 24, 2010 @ 9:50 pm

I have spent many hours designing Facebook pages for my clients using the sidebar. You're going to erase it all just because you want to make a change? Does this mean no FBML tabs on sidebars too? What's the point of having an FB page if we can't make it our own?

Comment by Tara Benwell — August 25, 2010 @ 12:02 pm

I'm going to be going against the flow here. First, I also hate the idea that the profile box is going away.

However, I don't think it's the end of the world.

I believe smart facebook page owners would be thinking about building an application to replace their page. That allows you to have MUCH more interesting pages.

Don't abandon ship just yet, because with a bit of lateral thinking, there's some really exciting options available on Facebook.

Comment by Michael Phipps — August 26, 2010 @ 2:55 am

So…I still see these boxes on several pages including the examples listed above. Is this still happening? Are certain pages "grand-fathered" in and therefore exempt?

Can anyone give me an update?

Comment by Zenneia — September 3, 2010 @ 12:06 pm

Does this include the custom facebook sidebars that some people have made with their photo and biz logo? Or will that be able to stay in the photo section of your profile?

I really hate all the changes FB keeps making, sweeping away features that so many of us like. PLUS their process to proof your identity if they suspect you have malware on your computer – sheesh, it's insane.

Some other smart social media is gonna take over and we'll all move to that. Looks to me like FB just wants to clear more space for paid advertisers to have ads on our pages

Comment by Evelyn Roberts Brook — September 3, 2010 @ 5:15 pm

Evelyn hit the big nail squarely on its greedy head. Facebook is taking the boxes away so that advertisers can place ads there. Why limit ads to just the right side? They are making a killing on those ads.

In no time, we will see that bottom left area with ads. They may be cheaper than the right margin ads since they will be lower on the page, but they will be there. There is ZERO reason to get rid of the boxes and keep the space blank.

And adding what's in the boxes to the tabs is meaningless. People are not going to use the tabs to a large extent. Too much work.

Both Google and Facebook continually make changes that are unpopular for users but profitable for them. Never rely on any greedy Internet presence for anything. If you are not paying for it, don't count on it. And even if you pay, these sites have a TOS that allows them to take your children if they so decide.

Do not build your business model on them.

Comment by Sam — September 5, 2010 @ 2:32 pm

In the road map, Facebook said “boxes on profiles and Pages, and application info sections will be going away”

but still i can see it on below fan pages
http://www.facebook.com/cocacola?v=wall&__a=7&
House Rules

http://www.facebook.com/ATT?v=wall
Txtng Can Wait

can’t sure removed or not… ?

Comment by Prakash Paghdal — September 6, 2010 @ 4:31 am

Very disappointing! Just went through the process of switching from a group to a fan page, mainly because of added sidebar features. These boxes allow us to better customize our pages. Too bad, don't really understand the purpose.

Comment by Neil — September 8, 2010 @ 8:16 am

The boxes were not removed, they are just frozen. Can they be totally removed?

Comment by Becky — September 22, 2010 @ 12:26 pm

no wonder people don't like facebook anymore. Sick of all the changes! GET IT TOGETHER!

Comment by Sarah — September 26, 2010 @ 12:55 pm

this is just like myspace ; trying to get better , when it just really ruined it . Ughh , thats messed up .

Comment by mckayla morales — November 27, 2010 @ 11:20 pm

The rich color palette for UGG classic tall enables people more amazing surprise. As sheepskin can be dyed any color as far as you can imagine

Comment by Moonboots — December 10, 2010 @ 10:44 pm

As far as music goes here is a simple solution you might be interested in people. Yes facebook and myspace has turned to the dogs but you can do as I have and make a quick easy to load myspace page. Post it right on your wall so others can click it to that link and inly on the wall will it go to the myspace page automatically. I tried posting it to the "about me" section and it was pretty much worthless. Means you might have to repost it once in a while to get it back to the top, and might want to just keep your wall clean of other interferences such as posts, convos and other things not posted to your home page but it will work, heres my wall so you can see what i mean – http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1397995337 – and once you click on the -Musicpanel Dejay (music/panel) on Myspace- on my wall it will take you to my page. Yes it is linking MYSPACE in with FACEBOOK but at least you will have players. Keep in mind my players are not standard but you sould still be able to work with friendster the same way. I hope you see this as helpful

Comment by nintynine_waystodie — January 14, 2011 @ 2:30 am

Trust me MYSPACE is so far down the crapper is dont know if theres any saving it after 3.0, Im an avid fan but its no longer worth the pixels it takes to make a computer monitor. Sense the changover they forced my page wont even work. My main page mind you and my secondary i use to link with other links to get players through them barely does. I agree the new facebook page sucks but at least it functions. DO NOT go back to myspace until 3.0 finally gets realized to be the trainwreck it is and they find a good alternative. If you think this is bad myspace is 10 times worse right now.

Comment by nintynine_waystodie — January 14, 2011 @ 2:36 am

Now Facebook's sidebar boxes has been replaced to a million dollar worth ads..

Comment by xave — January 27, 2011 @ 3:20 pm

What is the point in having a band page on Facebook if your fans can't even list to your music???????

Comment by Greg — February 24, 2011 @ 12:52 am

Not a problem! Just get yourself a facebook sidebar. We do them at http://www.digital-stationery.co.uk/

Comment by @BigDogStudioX — March 1, 2011 @ 4:32 am

I miss the old profile boxes. I can't get them back??

Comment by Bailey — April 26, 2011 @ 9:40 am

I couldnt "effing" agree more. FB treats us all like plebs.

Comment by Barry B — June 28, 2011 @ 12:17 pm

Some people might like it, but i dont its annoying me. How can i take it down? If thats possible.

Comment by Destiny — July 7, 2011 @ 9:37 pm

i wish the chat sidebar will be removed too :3

Comment by Joselyn Yu — July 18, 2011 @ 1:18 am

I know right?!! The old facebook was better! they should have a voting poll or whatnot to ask us if we like something before throwng it out there and f***king everything upppp!!

Comment by jacke — July 18, 2011 @ 3:44 pm

Are facebook sidebars office addons some facebook? Are they safe, can they see login & password info? Concerns me about the amount of data facebook have let alone having things routed thru third parties.

Comment by Martin Phipps — September 19, 2011 @ 4:45 am

Yes, Sidebar Boxes Will Be Removed From Facebook Pages

Recommended Articles

Inside Social Apps 2012 is Less Than Two Weeks Away

1696356 Comments2010-08-11+13%3A54%3A34Caitlin+Fitzsimmons »

Leave a comment

Follow AllFacebook

Send us a Tip

Social Media Jobs

Let your next job find you!

Featured Company

Jobs of the Day

Digital Strategist

Digital/Social Media Manager - Entertainment

Social Media Coordinator

See all jobs

Upcoming Events

Yes, Sidebar Boxes Will Be Removed From Facebook Pages

Recommended Articles

Inside Social Apps 2012 is Less Than Two Weeks Away

1696356 Commentshttp%3A%2F%2Fwww.allfacebook.com%2Ffacebook-boxes-removed-2010-08Yes%2C+Sidebar+Boxes+Will+Be+Removed+From+Facebook+Pages2010-08-11+13%3A54%3A34Caitlin+Fitzsimmonshttp%3A%2F%2Fwww.allfacebook.com%2F%3Fp%3D16963 »

Leave a comment

Follow AllFacebook

Send us a Tip

Social Media Jobs

Let your next job find you!

Featured Company

Jobs of the Day

Digital Strategist

Digital/Social Media Manager - Entertainment

Social Media Coordinator

See all jobs

Upcoming Events

1696356 Comments2010-08-11+13%3A54%3A34Caitlin+Fitzsimmons »