Facebook is sticking to its guns over its decision to remove support for application boxes on user profiles.
Members started reporting their profile boxes had disappeared earlier this month, but there appeared to be a reprieve after a slew of complaints. At the current time, some users still have application boxes on their profiles, but the feature is disabled for new accounts.
A Facebook spokeswoman confirmed the boxes would disappear but did not elaborate on the reasons. “As we announced last year, we will no longer be supporting profile boxes from applications,” she told AllFacebook.com. “People can more easily showcase their favorite applications by bookmarking them, or highlighting them in their application tabs. We’re always evaluating new and interesting ways for people to express themselves through their connections with applications, and we’ll continue to listen to user feedback about how we help make Facebook profiles even more useful and relevant.”
One reader of AllFacebook told us that profile boxes were disappearing from all new Facebook Pages, yet not the existing ones. We have not been able to confirm whether or not this is the case though. There are plenty of small business who are frustrated with this change as it removes the ability to get new fans to enter their email address as well as add other types of calls to action. Whether or not Facebook plans on pulling boxes all together is unknown, however new Page creators have been reporting that the feature is gone.
We use Static FBML boxes on our page to offer fans a way to donate to our non-profit. Don’t know what we’d do if it went away. What is the alternative besides a tab?
Users cannot add new boxes, but boxes that have been added in the past are still there. Not for long though, they’re being removed in early August. Here’s a link to the Google cache of the FB live status page which quietly announces it on 8th July (the FB live status page is not working at the time of writing)
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:aXkw8SWVYT8J:developers.facebook.com/live_status+http://developers.facebook.com/live_status%23msg_641&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=uk
“As we announced in November, we are no longer supporting boxes on Profiles and Pages and encourage developers to use application tabs instead. We will be moving away from profile boxes in two phases. Starting next week, users will no longer be able to add new boxes, and in early August, users will no longer see any existing profile boxes. We will provide information to help users with profile boxes find your applications.”
David Stillwell
- Founder of myPersonality
why do you people keeping deleting our profile boxes? and how do we keep the ones we already have on facebook???
I hate how these social sites, which make money from the people on it, refuse to listen to the people that make their sites successful.
Can’t wait for Diaspora*!!!!
We WANT our Profile Boxes!!!
Facebook. Stop it! you can’t change your rules everyday.
We users, developers, brands are bored about it.
One day we will be free and won’t have to support this anymore. Continue like this and we will find some other network to do the job.
Don’t think your are invincible. Remember the ones that was thinking they were not such a longtime ago (and Myspace is just a recent one).