Facebook Stories launched on mobile devices earlier this year. The shameless Snapchat Stories clone follows Facebook’s runaway success with implementing the feature on Instagram. TechCrunch reports it’s now rolling out on desktop devices too, bringing it to every Facebook user.
On phones, Stories shows up as a strip at the top of the News Feed. Facebook’s using a different layout on desktop that’s less intrusive, mitigating some of the criticism of the feature. As shown in a screenshot captured by TechCrunch, Stories appears as a small box to the right of the main News Feed.
The launch means Facebook Stories is now available on all the major platforms where the social network is offered. The decision to rollout Stories to the desktop site hasn’t been received well though. Users have attacked Facebook for cluttering its interface and diluting the value of the Stories concept with another implementation. Appetite for another place to post ephemeral photos and videos is low.
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Uptake of Facebook Stories has been so crushingly disappointing that Facebook was forced to rollout an update to disguise its lack of usage. A mere week after Stories landed on iOS and Android, Facebook changed the design of the feature to show “ghost” pictures of friends who haven’t posted in a while.
Before the change, the Stories strip would appear blank if no friends had shared an update in the past 24 hours. It now contains placeholder profile pictures in an effort to prevent the Stories strip looking so barren. The response from users suggests it isn’t working.
The tech press hasn’t welcomed the arrival of Stories on desktop either. The Next Web described the feature as unnecessary, pointing out that 90 percent of Facebook users visit from a mobile device. If those people aren’t creating Stories, it’s implausible that the remaining 10 percent of desktop users will make a big difference.
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“Let’s be honest, nobody was pining over the inability to create ephemeral content from their webcam,” wrote The Next Web’s Bryan Clark.
Mashable’s Karissa Bell was similarly sceptical, writing that Stories will not “make much of a difference” and “Facebook’s Stories obsession is getting old fast.”
With users overwhelmingly reluctant to use Facebook Stories, the future of the feature seems to be uncertain. Facebook hasn’t revealed any usage stats and the frosty reception makes it unlikely it ever will. The company struck gold with Instagram Stories but seems to be learning the hard way that people will only upload ephemeral content to so many places at one time.
Facebook Stories is rolling out now to desktop users across the world. It may take some time to reach you as it’s still officially “considered a test.”
