The most visible change will occur when users log into their profile. "The new home page will let you see everything that's shared by your friends and connections as it happens," Zuckerberg explained in a post to the Facebook blog. "It will also provide you more control by letting you choose exactly who you see among the people and things you are connected to."

Among other things, Zuckerberg said, users will be able to filter update streams so they can see updates from specific groups of friends. In addition, users will be able to see updates from celebrities and businesses by following them, much as people "follow" each other on Twitter.

Profile Concept Will Change

During a two-hour press conference to announce the changes, Zuckerberg praised both Twitter and MySpace for their innovative ways of connecting people. Chris Cox, Facebook's director of product development, said the company will introduce a feature that will change the concept of a profile and bring it more in line with Twitter's approach.

"The limit today with [Facebook] profiles," Cox said, "is that you can't reach a large audience with profiles. You can't have more than 5,000 people receiving your updates. So now you can set your privacy settings so you still have that intimate connection, but you can distribute your content to far more people who aren't friends. It sounds like a Twitteresque follow system, in that it's one-sided."

Zuckerberg added that the purpose of the change is to make the site more friendly for businesses and high-profile individuals to connect to customers and fans. "What we're talking about today," he said, "is that there's a philosophical change in that we want to converge these public figures (which are one-way) and friends (two-way connections). People asking for 5,000 friends don't necessarily want to connect with 5,000 people, they want to let 5,000 people connect with them."

Faster Updates

Another Twitter-style feature that will make an appearance in the new Facebook design are real-time updates. Currently, Facebook updates its feeds on a regular schedule, roughly every 10 minutes or so. The company will now pick up the pace.

By increasing the speed of updates and bringing them closer to real time, Facebook increases the likelihood that location-based services (particularly advertising) will be part of the company's future.

"[Location-based services] are going to be important things in the future," Zuckerberg said. "We're at a place today where we think things are increasing in speed; in the future the LBS stuff will be even more possible. I think you'll see is a directionality of being able to serve both public and closed services. We're going to be rolling out a lot more services through the rest of the year."