Facebook's Graph Search service – you know, the one Mark Zuckerberg announced way back in January – is finally beginning its public roll-out, starting today.
The enhanced search has been available to a very small number of people so far, but Facebook is now unleashing the service onto several hundreds of millions of U.S. users this week.
What does Facebook Graph Search do, you ask? Well, we promise that it's a little more exciting than it sounds. A little.
The tool is designed to let you search through your connections for very specific information on people.
For example, you could search for "my friends who like Snow Patrol" and it should then return with a list of all the people you need to unfriend immediately. You can get as specific as you like.
- Check out our first impressions of Facebook Graph Search here
You're having a graph!
For the time being, only those using 'U.S. English' Facebook will be able to access the service, which may mean that U.K. users can also get involved if they don't mind sacrificing a few "u"s to do so. After six months of testing the water, Facebook will then send it global.
Probably just as well though. The New York Times claims that the feature is still a little buggy right now, struggling to get its head around synonymous phrases, for example.
On its end, Facebook claimed that the service has improved thanks to early testing, with faster speed, better query understanding, more relevant results and an improved interface. The company said it's working on even more improvements, such as easier topic search and discovery, including for posts and comments. What's more, Graph Search mobile is on the horizon.
We found the service worked just fine when we tried it out here in the States, getting eerily specific the more markers we searched for.
Look for an automatic update rolling out now, U.S. English Facebookers, and let us know what you think of Graph Search so far.
