What You Need to Know About Facebook’s Timeline – The Geek Girl Report

In the 5 or so years I've been using Facebook, I've seen a lot of major changes to the site. Some of them have been OK, and some of them have been pretty annoying. But Facebook's latest change is the most drastic yet, and a lot of people aren't too happy about it.

It's called the Timeline, Facebook's new profile interface. With Timeline, you can scroll through a user's complete history of their time on Facebook, or at least, what they've chosen to show.

Before you get started with Timeline, you have a seven-day "grace period," where you can pick and choose exactly what shows up on your Timeline. From there, you can then choose a "cover photo," a large photo that goes across the top of your profile page. It doesn't have to be a picture of you, per say. It can be anything, like a landscape or a photo of your pet. It's just a way to set your profile apart from the other users.

However, if you started using Facebook in its' early days, when it was strictly for college students, you may have posted some pictures or some posts that you're not particularly proud of. Now with Timeline making all of that information readily available, those pictures and posts can come back to haunt you. You can, of course, choose not to show those pictures when you switch over to Timeline. And it's not like people couldn't see those posts before. (Remember, when you post something to Facebook, or anywhere else on the Internet, it's not private anymore.)  But still, a lot of people are not happy with the changes being made.

But whether you like the new Timeline feature or hate it, you better get used to it. Last week, Facebook announced that Timeline will soon become mandatory for all users. So start learning how to use Timeline now, because in a few days, you won't have a choice.