Skip to main content

Facebook’s testing a Timehop feature to remind you why you avoided Facebook a year ago

facebook testing on this day nostalgia feature
Image used with permission by copyright holder

Millennials are all about documenting their lives on the Internet – that’s why Instagram, Twitter, and Foursquare are all the rage. We want to know what we’re doing, seeing, hearing, eating, and thinking at all hours of the day – and preferably on a service where friends can like and comment on such activities. But once that time passes, do any of those information matter anymore? Facebook wants to remind you of those remedial moments with its new Timehop-esque feature that lets you jump one year back to see exactly what was going on in your life 360-something days ago.

Currently in beta testing, Facebook’s “On This Day” tab allows users to see what happened one year back. The results aren’t limited to just you (unless you’re one to post something every day): The tab curates a list of status updates, check-ins, comments, and photos posted from you and your entire friends list. If various life events happened, such as a new job, new apartment, or an engagement happened, those updates are likely to skyrocket to the top of the news feed. It’s like looking at your Facebook homepage again from a year ago and remembering why you avoided the site during Election Season. Nobody cares what your political views are on Facebook. Hello, it’s Facebook.

Recommended Videos

On This Day is apparently rolling up in random user’s feeds, with non-chronological results to highlight some of the “best” moments from this day a year back. The feature is also popping up for various accounts accessing the site via the Facebook iOS app, suggesting that the team is taking its users’ love for Throwback Thursdays seriously and will consistently remind you that the Internet never forgets. Hey, remember how [Fake Friend A] didn’t invite you to her housewarming party? Here’s a photo to remind you of that fateful day.

Are you excited about the possible launch of Facebook’s latest nostalgia app, or would you rather stick to your own pasts with Timehop? If you said the former, let’s hope you have some very interesting friends.

[Photo via The Next Web]

Natt Garun
Former Digital Trends Contributor
An avid gadgets and Internet culture enthusiast, Natt Garun spends her days bringing you the funniest, coolest, and strangest…
This Facebook feature can help you help others in pandemic
Crisis Response Hub

Facebook has activated its Community Help tool that enables people to offer assistance, and ask for it, too.

The move comes as the U.S. and other countries around the world grapple with the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, with a growing number of people around the world ordered to stay home in an effort to slow the spread of the virus.

Read more
Facebook’s latest experimental app lets you document your hobbies
Facebook Hobbi screenshots

Facebook’s year-old New Product Experimentation (NPE) division, where developers are tasked with building unique and experimental tools, has released its fourth app, according to The Information. Called Hobbi, the new app, as its name suggests, allows users to document and keep tabs on the progress of their personal projects or hobbies.

You can easily mistake Hobbi for a Pinterest clone, as much of its design is clearly inspired by the photo-sharing social network. But Hobbi is a more personal platform and doesn’t even have a social networking component. Facebook bills it as a place where you can "capture and organize your creative process." The app lets you sort pictures of your projects in various collections such as home decor, fitness, music, and what have you.

Read more
You will soon be able to migrate your Facebook photos and videos to Google Photos
close up of someone deleting the Facebook app off their iPhone

Facebook will soon let you easily migrate those hundreds of old photos and videos you uploaded ages ago to other services like Google Photos. In a blog post, the social network said it’s rolling out a new tool in Ireland that allows you to port your Facebook media without having to manually download and upload it someplace else.

The announcement is the result of Facebook’s participation in the Data Transfer Project, an open-source initiative to enable cross-platform data migration between various platforms. Facebook has been a member of the project for a while along with Apple, Google, Twitter, and more. Incidentally, the tools that allow you to download all your Facebook or Google data were based on the code developed through the Data Transfer Project as well.

Read more