Facebook aims to make your posts more relevant with contextual content cards in iOS app

Facebook has just released Facebook for iOS 10.0 and with it, the company is bringing Google Now-style contextual cards for each of your posts.   The updated app comes with the contextual cards feature with content including photos of restaurants you have checked in at, listing friends you have checked in with or mentioned in a post, and friends who have listened to the song you just posted. The app lets you review a preview of a status update and strip out any unwanted suggested links Facebook plans to append in the form of these cards. You can edit which pages which will linked to.   One thing is for sure, by making these cards contextual, Facebook is trying to show that your posts are not just posts, by showing you real-time feedback through images, pages, links and a few things about your friends as well. It uses color-coded cards: green for content, red for places, yellow for photos, and blue for birthdays.   And it’s not like Facebook will throw up the same cards for each of your posts. When you just mention watching a movie, it will show you which of your friends also watched it, or liked it. This also works for music, books and TV shows. If you post from a certain location, it will throw up cards showing your friends’ post from the same spot. If you tag a friend whose birthday it is, it will show you a card reminding you of it, in case you had actually forgotten.   In a way this is the company’s Facebook Now app. Facebook is clearly showing its users that their presence on the network is not perfunctory and it actually has links to other friends. One could also say that it’s helping strengthening friendships by showing common interests that may not surface elsewhere.   This is, of course, not the first contextual suggestions experiment by Facebook. Page posts you’ve liked throw up other so-called similar pages and the same goes for news articles. But this is a little more urgent. Essentially by putting in the smartphone app, Facebook is trying to become more than just your go-to app for time-killing. It’s trying to ensure that you are using the app for a little bit longer, by throwing up connections. It’s banking on the serendipity factor. Of course, the potential to sell this space to businesses has presumably not gone unnoticed. Like for example, suggesting nearby stores when you check in at a certain location, based on your interests on Facebook. That could very well be in the pipeline, but for now it’s about keeping the news feed fresh. At least on the iOS app.   In addition to the cards, Facebook for iOS now lets you compose posts while offline or in weak connectivity. Your post will published when you are back in range. Facebook claims to have made some speed improvements as well.