Last week I mentioned many people were waiting for the Facebook 3.0 update on the iPhone. Honestly, I wasn’t. I used not to be such an intensive user of the previous version. The interface didn’t satisfy me, besides hardly any of my European friends were using Facebook and Twitter took most of my “free” time. Curious as I am I decided to install this new version to give it a try. Some days later I have to admit that I am still positively surprised about the major change of the usability of the application. But I have a major remark as well.

Why didn’t I get an auto update trigger?

Initially I was not so eager to use the new application. I read on Twitter about it, but I didn’t receive an auto update trigger on my iPhone. To be honest I still don’t understand this. Alerted by the “buzz” I had to visit the App Store and look up the Facebook 3.0 application. At first, I didn’t even realize that the available application was the new one. No indication at all that it is about 3.0. Just after entering the description it became clear that indeed version 3.0 is available in the App Store.

Furthermore nothing but good news

After this initial disappointment I was not expecting too much. I was wrong. After using the application for some minutes I already had to admit Facebook 3.0 is a big step forward. The user interface is a lot more clear and user friendly and notifies you about new updates and requests. Within some clicks you get what you need. It’s a lot easier to follow my Friends and Pages. Sending an update is just a matter of opening the Facebook application, which makes it almost easier than sending an update through Twitter. Besides there is more space than the 140 character limitation on Twitter.

I started using Facebook a lot more

Over the last few days, I have started using Facebook a lot more. Especially, since you can also upload images very easily through the iPhone it is really possible to share what your are doing with your friends. It makes the communication a lot (content) richer. Recently, I’ve noticed that Facebook is becoming more and more popular among my European friends as well. It looks like Facebook 3.0 arrived just in time! I feel that soon I will have to consider whether I continue with Twitter. My opinion about Facebook is changing dramatically towards positive in the last days.

Will Facebook manage to become the worldwide phone directory?

Today Facebook announced it has reached a milestone of 65 million people actively using Facebook from mobile devices. According to the company, this is the increase from just 20 million about 8 months ago. In my opinion the popularity of the iPhone combined with Facebook 3.0 will only stimulate a further increase. Some time ago I read an interview with Facebook’s CEO. He stated that Facebook aims to become the worldwide communication platform. Seeing these figures and experiencing the progress in the usability of their applications they seem to be on the right track. An underlying IP network only seems to be lacking.

I am curious about your experiences, feel free to share them below, or meet and discuss on Facebook or through Twitter via @GOYELLO or @PetersOpinion.