Facebook Looks To Improve Apps With Stricter Open Graph Policies

One of Facebook's biggest strategies is on apps. The company introduced App Center and Open Graph a while ago to push more users towards using various apps, and today Facebook is improving on that system once again, but they're actually making changes that will benefit the user this time around.

First, Facebook is changing how open graph stories display on a user's feed. The company's research indicates that stories with an image and location are among the most popular and most engaging, so Facebook is giving the apps that provide this information more priority over other apps. Facebook says that these kinds of stories generate 70% more clicks.

The other major change (and probably the best change) has to do with custom actions. All apps must now use Facebook-approved built-in actions, since in the past, stories would publish automatically to a user's feed without the user even knowing. However, with the new change, automatically-published stories will be done in a way that helps "set user expectations."

Facebook is also getting rid of two features that users have loathed for a while now. The first feature getting the ax is authenticated referrals, which were only there to annoy users by asking for permissions without very much context. The second feature going bye-bye is the "Post to Friend's Wall" option. It turns out that a lot of users were responding to apps being posted on their wall by clicking "Hide" or "Mark as spam."

Obviously, developers will now have to go back into their apps and make the appropriate changes to bring them up to Facebook's new code. They'll have 90 days to do so, or their app will be removed until the changes are made.