Facebook’s iconic Like button has been around since the service’s inception and has practically become a part of internet culture. In Facebook’s opinion, however, it’s actually a vestige of internet culture; they have announced a brand new Like button, along with a new Share button. Citing increased engagement in field testing, the new buttons have axed the Facebook “f” logo in favor of a more simple and clean look, along with a few new features for developers that will allow them to be used in more places and with higher effectiveness. Two new Chrome extensions were also unveiled in today’s announcement from Facebook Developers, made to tie into the sharing and saving features built into Facebook.
The new Like button replaces the iconic Facebook logo and “Like” scrawling with a more oblong and much simpler design, showing a thumbs up icon, the word “Like”, and the approximate number of likes so far. The new icon is a bit sleeker and simpler, while bearing a bit more information. Since it retains the classic blue and white color scheme, people will still mostly associate it with Facebook. The new Share button is similar to the old Like button, bearing the classic Facebook “f” logo and the word “Share”, a somewhat cleaner design that associates the button and its function more strongly with Facebook. The Follow and Save to Facebook buttons have gotten a similar redesign. “Exhaustive testing” took place to ensure the new designs wouldn’t clash with any old code where the buttons had found their way onto websites, and the announcement stated that Facebook Instant Articles publishers will be able to get those buttons onto their content in the near future. Facebook included developer documentation for implementing the new buttons in their post about their debut.
The announcement also detailed two new Chrome extensions. The extensions are simple and fairly straightforward, allowing Chrome users to essentially carry the Share and Save to Facebook buttons with them around the web. Anywhere a user with these extensions goes, they can save something they find, to Facebook for later reading and sharing, or they can simply share something they’ve found then and there. The Share extension allows users to share any content to their page, to a group on Facebook, or to a friend or group of friends via Messenger.
