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Facebook tells its iOS users to continue expecting app updates every 4 weeks

If you’re an avid Facebook user on the iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch, the social networking giant has some good news for you. In yesterday’s 13.0 update, Facebook informs users that app updates with speed and performance enhancements will be arriving every four weeks. That’s about monthly. New features and other enhancements will come along the way, Facebook says, and those changes will be noted appropriately. Facebook seems to want users to get the latest iOS app updates as soon as possible, so it is recommending that users enable iOS 7’s Automatic Downloads feature via the iOS Settings app. A couple of years ago, Facebook said it would be bringing new updates to its mobile applications every 4-8 weeks, but this marks the first time that Facebook is actively notifying users of this development approach. Facebook seems to have begun monthly updates around February, but at least we now know the company has no intention of stopping that pattern.

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Comments

  1. Daniel (@Danielon81) - 10 years ago

    I’ve updated but doesn’t connect with wifi or 3G/4G.

  2. Continue to expect me to never install any of them. I’m quite happy on version 8.0 that you can’t kill the messaging ability on, and that’s where I’ll be staying. Thank you. New ≠ Better.

    • lexxkoto - 10 years ago

      I’m sure they can kill the messaging feature, along with everything else in old versions, if they want.

  3. nelmat - 10 years ago

    Counter-intuitive mess. All that remained for me was the messaging functionality, with this as a separate app, I might as well use messages.

  4. claytonkimball - 10 years ago

    I suspect they wrote that because it sounds better than “this update removes the app’s ability to send messages.”

  5. Don Wise (@doncwise) - 10 years ago

    I’ve removed both apps from all my devices yesterday; tired of seeing different feeds and messaging even though subscribed to both equally. Not enjoyable when someone calls me out for not responding to their post when not visible on iPad, but appears days later on iPhone and vice-versa; and this all occurred before their “change”. I’m about done with FB. Twitter is by far superior.

  6. cjt3007 - 10 years ago

    Or, instead of having to update every four weeks, why don’t they just add all of the stuff now in the next update? #howtocoding

  7. Alex Gardner - 10 years ago

    I deleted my app. I only had it so I could chat with a couple of online friends while having a smoke. I’m not downloading several different apps to chat with a few people!

  8. 2112entropy - 10 years ago

    Messaging is still on the update

  9. Brandon Powell - 10 years ago

    I’ll be glad when I’ll be able to get FB notifications again. Ever since I updated to iOS 6 I no longer get notifications from FB. I have to actually go to the app to see if I have a notifications. Hopefully with these more frequent updates they’ll finally fix this. Fingers crossed!

  10. Jennine Clark Donier - 10 years ago

    I don’t know what they did and I do not use mobile or cellphones on facebook but I cannot send messages and or open them and posting status does not show it posted and chat is not showing friends or loading right either. As to reporting a problem YEAH right you can fill it all out give a screen shot but it won’t send for a report. There are other issues too and it is hard to use a lot of things now. While they are gung ho on fixing it for mobile users they are screwing it up for the rest who dont’ use them. Even the comment edit thing is messed up now. I HATE it can’t do much of anything and that includes upload photos

  11. billymiller - 10 years ago

    Now it’s an update every 2 weeks. Why not update the app every day? This is absurd.

  12. whitelotus88 - 9 years ago

    People make too big a deal about updates. Nobody actually talks about what exactly is getting updated, they just care about updates. “I want my updates!” Like a screaming child. They don’t care if the app is actually getting better, they just want to see that it got updated. That’s it.

    So if I’m an app developer, just change 2 lines of code, and call it an update. Just do this twice per month and say you’ve implemented performance enhancements. That’s all Facebook is doing, cause there’s no way on god’s green earth every single one of these Facebook “Updates” is changing the app all that much.

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