Facebook announced a number of new initiatives, including Groups, application control and better data portability at the company’s event today.
On the data portability front, Facebook has now made it possible to download all of the content and information that you have added to Facebook. This means that you can download your photos, videos, wall posts, conversation threads and status updates.
This information will then be prepared and downloadable as zip file. Rather than just getting all of the data in a structureless archive, the data can be viewed in your web browser and will be easy to access and sort through.
This is a pretty big step for Facebook, a platform that has often been criticized for acting as a walled garden. The ability to get your information out of Facebook, if for no other reason than to make copies or backups of photos and videos, is a solid move toward being more open and transparent.
Check out this video Facebook created explaining the new feature.
Users will be able to download their data later this afternoon by accessing a new feature in the Account Settings section of Facebook. After re-entering your password, your data will be prepared and you will get a notification when the file is ready for download.
What do you think about a more portable Facebook? Let us know.
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