F/b groups

Like many aspiring people aged <35, I use Facebook most days. My use even increased after an evaluation of the 2010 State Election in Victoria found that Facebook posts were the quickest way of disseminating information and receiving responses.

They must have realised this too, with the introduction of its 'groups' feature. This allows even more rapid communication among a selective audience, including with reference documents. In this, they may be attempting competition with other organisational-focused digital applications, like Slack [which I also use in my volunteer work, but I digress].

For example, here's one I use for my tabletop gaming group, for 1^st edition Pathfinder. Mostly, it's used for notifications of upcoming game sessions, and a progressive record of the team's activities and achievements from previous sessions. In the section marked 'files', I put reference documents to which I can direct the group members. These include basic rules clarifications, pre-generated character ideas – A. K. A. Pre-gen's – a simplified guide to making player-characters –
A. K. A. P. C.s – and other trivia particular to the campaign setting.

[For those who are curious: I'm designing one based on Australasia and the Pacific islands, as opposed to the European/North American default. I enjoy exploring the implications of this on technology, politics, and even diet. Having an undergrad. major in sociology will do that.]

Effectively, this operates much like a shared 'page' for Facebook, to which access can be restricted by the moderators. To illustrate this difference, and its importance, I'll use a political example. The “Australian Greens politics, news and discussion” group has public access. Anyone can become a member of this group, and any member can post on the shared wall/timeline. By contrast, “Discussion group for all of us” is a private group for those who are active in campaigns for the Greens. There are probably others, but I'm unaware of them yet, thanks to the 'hidden' access setting. Only current members can invite new members; for everyone else, it won't even appear in search listings.

Facebook groups have a 'announcement' feature, only available to admin's/moderators of the group, while anyone can be part of the 'discussion'. Announcements are listed separately from the general discussion, meaning that members also get separate notifications for them.

One feature which groups lack would be a group chat facility. My gaming group did make one, so that we could more rapidly coordinate availability. I think there's a missed opportunity to link a function in Facebook's instant messenger, so that you can import all the contacts from a group, instead of having to remember them individually.

Another new feature for Facebook groups is 'units'. I discovered this feature through the members' group for a university choir which I'm in.

This is a more interactive or "gamified" combination of posting and internal files. Simply by reading the post and clicking 'done' at the end, it will be marked as being 'completed'. You don't get a 'badge' or anything, like if you keep viewing and interacting with posts from a page makes you a "top fan" or "conversation starter" for a week.

Presumably though, there is back-end data showing who has done the unit and who hasn't. For this group, the big idea would be not having to spend/waste time explaining the dress code for concerts to everyone, every time, and this feature would be more accessible and interesting than merely reading a policy document. Therefore, I foresee that this could be a tool used for enforcement, to be sure that everyone is on the same level before turning up.

In short, Facebook groups have plenty of features which make them more useful than merely scrolling down your wall or checking on constant notifications. Continuous innovations like this are what has made them stand out from the digital social media that came before, and makes them continue to be relevant, as one of the #23things to know about digital information media.