When I navigated to one of the Facebook Networks pages yesterday (which I rarely do), I had a message waiting for me at the top of the page:

Facebook will be discontinuing Network Pages, a feature that stemmed from the early days when Facebook was solely for students. As some may recall, Facebook initially launched and gained popularity as semi-isolated micro-communities within the community, requiring a school email in order to join one of these networks.

When Facebook opened its doors to the masses in late 2006, Facebook Networks became more of a geographic based categorization that I felt was not very useful. Being a part of a group as big as a major metropolitan area reduces the overall relevancy of the information that is provided about activity in the area. I’d much rather be a part of self-selected niche groups that relate to what I am interested in and communicated this to several Facebook insiders in the past.

The official response that I received from Facebook when I inquired about this decision:

“Facebook has decided to remove the Network Portals because we have found that most users tend to get network information from their feeds, such as News Feed and Mini-Feed, rather than navigating to the portals. Groups, Pages and users’ feeds continue to enable users to connect with the people in their networks and discover the most relevant information.”

The Facebook Network Pages were a good idea when a network was a users school, creating that micro-community feel for users. I think that the people behind Facebook are on top of things and are making a lot of good decisions that will ultimately benefit them as Facebook continues to evolve.

The application, launched in April, allows Facebook users with military experience to display details of their military service within a seamlessly integrated box on their Facebook profile.

Over 4,000 users installed the useful, viral application during the initial testing phase. Nearly 10,000 users adopted the application within the first 30 days- without an associated media spend.

Users can add their branch, duty status and the time spent at specific duty stations. In addition, the application enables users to search for other members of the U.S. Armed Services using the same criteria.

The My Military Experience Facebook application is free and readily available to Facebook users serving in or connected to the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corp or Coast Guard. Individuals can add the application by searching for “Military Experience” in the Facebook application directory, or by visiting apps.facebook.com/military-experience.