Ger Yang, a child development student at Fresno State, finds the new
Facebook layout “confusing.”
Esteban Cortez / The Collegian

With rumors of Facebook making the “Timeline” feature mandatory, users are cautioned to prepare for the strings that are expected to come attached if the change occurs.

Dr. Tamyra Pierce, the department chair of mass communication and journalism, says that even if your account is private, there are some loopholes for other users to see your content.

“If you’ve posted something on someone else’s wall and they don’t hide it, then it could be on their Timeline,” said Pierce. “There’s nothing different in that ”” we’ve forever said, ‘Be careful what you post up there.’”

Pierce also said users should do their homework and go through their profile to clean up what they don’t want to be seen ”” especially by employers.

Rita Bocchinfuso-Cohen, the director of Career Services, agrees with Pierce and said now is the time to also take a look at privacy settings.

“Our National Association does regular surveying of employers,” said Bocchinfuso-Cohen. “The most recent job outlook, the job outlook for the class of 2012 that they published, they ask employers what kind of activities they plan to increase as far as recruiting and using social networks is one that’s been increasing the past several years.”

Bocchinfuso-Cohen said the most recent survey said that 57.1 percent of employers were going to increase their use of social networks.

Bocchinfuso-Cohen also pointed out that Facebook users can use “Timeline” as an advantage with the feature by using a visual relative to their career objective as the cover photo.

The cover photo displays a large image along the top of the user’s profile, with the profile picture overlapping on the bottom left-hand side.

Even though users could use the more visual appearance, some are not for the change.

“It’s easier to access people’s old news feeds, but at the same time, it’s also confusing,” said child development student Ger Yang. “I prefer the old layout because I’m used to it.”

A poll on The Collegian’s website asked visitors to give their opinion if they were in favor of Facebook making the “Timeline” feature mandatory.

Twenty voters weighed in, with 14 of the votes saying they like the old format. One vote said they would delete their account if the change occurred.

“People don’t like change,” said Pierce. “They don’t know what’s going to happen and how it’s going to affect them.”

Bocchinfuso-Cohen reminds that the switch is only optional at this time, but to be prepared anyway.

“Right now it’s optional, you can switch over to Timeline, and if you do that you cannot switch back because their plan is over the next few weeks ”” and there’s no exact date that I’ve seen, but they do plan to force everyone over to that new look,” Bocchinfuso-Cohen said.