Facebook launches Search FYI; challenges Google big time

Facebook has introduced a search feature that now makes individual posts searchable, and allows searches to become universal. The feature includes all public posts.

“Today, we’re updating Facebook Search so that in addition to friends and family, you can find out what the world is saying about topics that matter to you,” said Tom Stocky, VP of Search, in a blog post.

The social networking giant wants to expand search to its entire pool of two trillion posts. The update was first rolled-out to US English language users across the globe. It includes not just the Friends and Pages they “Like”, but also public posts and Pages by all Facebook users.

Facebook is now able to deliver timely and personalised suggestions while highlighting trending events. Search results will be unique to each user, who can control and restrict others from viewing their posts. Users can always change the audience of past posts.

“With one tap, you can find public posts about a link, see popular quotes and phrases mentioned in these posts, and check out an aggregate overview of sentiment,” added Stocky.

According Facebook, users make over 1.5 billion searches each day. Indexing the whole world’s conversation will reveal the most trending and viral news of the day, said The Verge.

With the introduction of this search feature, Facebook is better equipped to combat Twitter and Google for real time news searches. Facebook’s Search FYI team promises to share more frequent updates and aims to make the feature more refined.

Twitter recently launched Moments, which helps users quickly find the most relevant news, search for live events and read about sports and other trending topics. With Search FYI, Facebook becomes a universal search engine.

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