You’ve probably noticed that Facebook has a popular trending news section on the right side of your page, but did you know that you can control the types of content shown there? Here’s how to customize it.
If your Facebook friends are like mine, they probably fall into two different groups: those who post links from the trending news section Facebook puts on the right side of your page, and those who complain about the trending news section on the right. your page.
However, what most people fail to realize is that you can really influence the types of stories that pop up in the trends section of Facebook.
The way it works is quite indirect. Facebook tries to find topics that interest you by analyzing whether you like your feed, your friends’ feeds, and current trending news. This is clever machine learning.
First, let’s take a look at the trending news section. It’s actually a little more complicated than most people think. There is a small list of stories, but you can click an arrow at the bottom of the section to see more stories that are starting to trend.
More relevant, however, is the way Facebook divides trending news into five different categories, unlike a series of Junk Follow-up questions. From the left are Top Trends, Politics, Science and Technology, Sports and Entertainment.
Unless you explicitly click a different icon and switch categories, Facebook will always show you the “Top Trends” section, which only contains the most trending stories of the moment – they are not limited to a particular category.
If you prefer to see stories about Science or Sports, click the corresponding icon and enjoy a Facebook trending news section without Hollywood gossip (and if you prefer Hollywood gossip, of course click on the old time projector).
But you can actually go a step further and directly influence the model Facebook creates about your choices.
When you hover over an entry in the Trending section, you will see a small ‘x’ appear on the right. Click the X and that story will disappear. Instead there will be a menu of options: Facebook wants to know why you decided you didn’t like the story, and this is an example where Facebook pays to give more information.
If it’s a story you don’t really care about, choose the first option and Facebook will adjust your model so that you’ll see fewer of these types of stories in the future. If you choose a different entry, Facebook will remove that particular story from your trending news section, but may do nothing about showing similar stories in the future.
If the Facebook trending news section really bothers you, unfortunately there’s no easy way to turn it off – certainly Facebook doesn’t allow it by default. Instead, you will have to resort to installing ad blockers or Facebook browser extensions of obscure origin. In general, it’s easier to just let it stay there and teach it to show what you love.
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