3 Reasons Why Social Fixer Hasn’t Been Updated Lately

If you use Social Fixer, you have probably noticed that some features no longer work correctly. So, why hasn’t it been updated lately to fix these problems? I’ll give you three reasons…

1. Family First

I’ve always said that my family and kids are my #1 priority, and I often measure my commitment to that principle by the decisions I actually make. As it turns out, the last few months have been incredibly busy for my family. Whether it’s weekend volleyball tournaments, track practices, or playing Frozen for the thousandth time, I try to do the things that are best for my family first, and work on my personal projects in whatever time is left. Since life has been busier than usual for a while, I’ve had less free time left to work on my side stuff.

And when I do have time, it’s often late at night and I’ve just found myself more exhausted than I’ve been in the past. So I just haven’t had the energy to stay up until 2am and sleep 4 hours before work. Maybe this is just what it feels like to be 40?!  

2. Facebook Code Changes

Facebook has changed a lot of its code with the latest update to the News Feed. Many of the page structures I used to hook into are changed or gone. Some of the components that used to control how the page worked have been changed. Some of the code that I used to access is now re-written to be hidden from me. Some meaningful names in the source like “intentional_stream” have been replaced with names like “_5qpr”.

It takes much longer to dig through their code than it used to. It’s written in a way that is forcing me to re-think what features I can even offer, and consider new ways of hooking into their source. Their changes have made my code more fragile.

Also, there is even more inconsistency between what users see. Some see the new feed, some don’t. Some have certain ads in their news feed, others don’t. Some see the class names on stories as “_qp5h” and some see them as “_3bpe”. So if I fix features to work with what I see, there is no guarantee that the code will work for others. That really impedes my ability to write code that works for everyone.

Facebook’s code has become an even more chaotic mess, from my perspective. I’m sure that on their end it’s organized and pre-processed. But what we see as users is a big jumbled mess of code that often doesn’t make any sense. I don’t know if some of these changes are in direct response to extensions like Social Fixer, but it sure feels like it. They have done a great job of making it really, really hard to keep Social Fixer working. That is really frustrating.

3. I’m Losing Interest In Facebook

Personally, I have found that my interest in Facebook is fading. I know that many other people feel the same way. I feel that many of their changes are completely anti-user, and they are making the experience worse and worse.

The site has always been primarily focused on harvesting personal information in order to sell targeted ads. But lately, I feel like this has become even more blatant. It feels like many changes and new features are intended only to fuel their advertising engine and raise their stock price, not benefit users or make the site better or easier to use.

So, I’ve found myself actually using Facebook less and less. Since I’m not as actively involved in it, I find fewer annoyances I want to tweak, and fewer features I want to add. This, combined with the increasing difficulty of actually coding those tweaks, means that some of the “fun” of working on Social Fixer has gone.

But An Update Is Coming…

With all that being said, I have found time recently to start making changes. I’ve already fixed a few bugs and updated code to get some features working again. I hope to have an update ready in the next few weeks. I have definitely not given up, and work on Social Fixer will continue!

A big part of the reason why I come back to this and work on it is because so many people have supported me and been generous with donations, sharing Social Fixer with friends, and creating a really cool community.

So thanks again for the support and patience, and expect an update with fixes and improvements soon!

– Matt Kruse, developer of Social Fixer