The Facebook Mom Problem Is Real. My mom loves me. But she also likes mea lot. And apparently, when she does so on Facebook, its hurting my chances of becoming the next viral sensation. On his blog, engineer Chris Aldrich explains what he calls The Facebook Algorithm Mom Problem. When you post something on Facebook, and your mom is the first to like it and how can she not Facebook thinks its a family related piece of content and sets the audience accordingly. Facebooks process for determining what goes into your News Feed is frustratingly opaque. However,Read more Read. Heres Aldrichs dilemma I write my content on my own personal site. I automatically syndicate it to Facebook. My mom loves me. But she also likes mea lot. And apparently, when she does so on Facebook, its hurting my chances of becoming the next viral sensation. Install Spotify Without Admin Rights On Facebook' title='Install Spotify Without Admin Rights On Facebook' />I post a lot to help market shelter and rescue dogs. I always want them to be public. I have checked the settings multiple times and I have everything chosen as public. Music streaming service Spotify no longer officially supports Apples Safari browser, and Safari users who attempt to access it say they are being redirected to use. Read the latest stories about Tech on Fortune. The Federal Trade Commission, the US government body in charge of consumer protection and investigating anticompetitive marketplace practices, has announced that it. My mom, who seems to be on Facebook 2. The Facebook algorithm immediately thinks that because my mom liked it, it must be a family related piece of contenteven if its obviously about theoretical math, a subject in which my mom has no interest or knowledge. Set Spotify as the default music streaming service. Amazon announced last year that it would add a Spotify skill to Alexas catalog, but in order to have it work. My mom has about 1. Facebook 4. 5 of them overlap with mine and the vast majority of those are close family members. The algorithm narrows the presentation of the content down to very close family. Then my moms sister sees it and clicks like moments later. Now Facebooks algorithm has created a self fulfilling prophesy and further narrows the audience of my post. As a result, my post gets no further exposure on Facebook other than perhaps five peoplethe circle of family that overlaps in all three of our social graphs. I, too, have a like happy mom. Two seconds after I post a story Ive writtensay, a 3,0. She hasnt read it, and probably never will, but she likes seeing her daughters face on her computer, and really, who can protest the unconditional support But because of her eager click, Facebook lumps the content in with my photos of Babys First Avocado, and shows it only to a small group of family members. While early likes by other relatives may have a similar effect, Aldrich says the algorithm problem does seem to be mostly mom oriented. Until Facebook stops penalizing mom auto likes, Aldrich writes that you can sidestep the problem with a little extra effort. Heres how to make sure your Facebook posts reach an audience beyond Mom, Aunt Susie and Uncle Ken in Kansas. Set the privacy settings of your post to either Friends except mom or Public except mom. I know what youre thinking. How awful How can you do that to your own motherDid you know that birthing you took 3. Millennials Wait, wait, wait, everyone. Theres a step two. At the end of the day, or as soon as it seems as though the post reached its maximum audience, change the audience settings to friends or public. Aldrich has been doing this, and has been seeing more impressions on his posts. Im happy to report that generally the intended audience which I wanted to see the post actually sees it, he writes. Mom just gets to see it a bit later. The Facebook Algorithm Mom Problem Boffo Socko. The Complete Guide to Facebook Privacy Settings. Privacy concerns and privacy controls on Facebook are ever changing. When you post a picture of your kids at a family gathering, which one of your Facebook friends can share itWhat private information are those Facebook game apps collecting on you for third party uses How do you make sure that live video stream is seen only by people you chooseEvery action you take on Facebook has privacy and sharing implications that need to be considered before you upload that next selfie. Fortunately, thanks to vocal demands for transparency from both Facebook users and government regulators around the world, Facebook has been making the process of managing your privacy easier. Below is our step by step guide to taking full control of your Facebook privacy settings. The basic privacy options. If youre not ready to dive into Facebooks substantial settings menu, theres a more user friendly guide through the more vital privacy settings. Click on the question mark symbol in the top right of any Facebook page when youre logged in, and select Privacy Check up, an easy to follow walkthrough of your current settings as they pertain to Posts, Apps and Profile. Alternately, for an even quicker speed tuneup, you can adjust who can see your posts, send you friend requests, or block users by hitting the question mark symbol and selecting Privacy shortcuts. Posts. Starting with Posts, you can check your default sharing setting. We recommend the Friends setting over the Public one. When set to Public all your posts can be seen by anyone on or off Facebook. Unless youre a celebrity or running a page that is used to generate interest in a business you run, you will likely want to keep your activity restricted to those you have Friended. The Friend setting has a few tweaks you should be aware of as well. By clicking on the sharing setting button, then the More Options button, you will see the Custom option. Click on that and you will see that you can include all your Friends, while excluding the names of certain Facebook friends you dont want seeing your updates. It is also important to note that the Friends of anyone tagged in your post or photos will be able to see that post unless you uncheck the option in this window. If you have joined any Facebook groups or made lists of Facebook friends, you can restrict the posts that way or hide your posts from those groups and lists as well. You just want your college friends to see your late night party pictures You want to make sure your work friends dont see your selfie at the beach when you called in sick This is where these restrictions could come in handy both on a per post basis or as an overall option. Finally, remember that you can change the sharing settings of any individual Facebook update by clicking on the sharing button to the left of the Post button. You can even go back to change settings of previous posts by clicking on the people icon at the top of the post, to the right of the date stamp. Apps. Remember the Candy Crush Facebook game you played too much last year How about that Instagram Facebook app you forgot you installed Each app on the site you agreed to install has permission to post to your Friends list unless you told it otherwise at the time you installed it. Cant remember This part of the tool shows you each app attached to your account and what sharing permissions it has. These settings also control who can see that you have the app installed. If you dont use the app anymore, just delete it by clicking on the x. While checking my own app list while writing this guide, I found many apps I no longer use that had sharing rights on my account. I deleted all that Im not actively using and set the sharing permissions of the remaining ones to Only Me. Profile. Here you can see the privacy setting on your email addresses, birthday, hometown, relationship status and other personal details about your life. Parts Of A Microsoft Word 2010. Under emails it will show the one you registered with when you first signed up for Facebook as well as one Facebook has assigned to you which you likely will never use. I discovered that I left my Gmail account public, which I hadnt meant to. For your birthday, the sharing settings are split between the daymonth and the year. That way your Friends can wish you happy birthday on Facebook on your special day without necessarily knowing your exact age. For hometown, this setting only affects what your Friends can see. Advertisers and others may still access this information, especially if you are using the Facebook app which tracks your location automatically. Finally, if you have set a relationship with another Facebook user, it will be shared unless you set otherwise. Its important to note that this is only a partial list of the information youre sharing. To see the full list, click the My About Page button, which will take you to your profile page. On there, you can review the various sectionsWork and Education, Places Youve Lived, Contact and Basic Info, Family and Relationships, Details About You, and Life Events and make changes hovering over each and clicking the link that appears. The advanced privacy options. Here you can exert more control of what is being shared with whom. Which is never a bad idea. Youve likely gone through this at least once in the past, but its a great idea to review your settings at least once a year. To get to the advanced privacy settings, click the drop down arrow in the top right on any Facebook page, click Settings, and then Privacy in the left navigation column. Who can see my stuff Who can see your future postsThis is the same as the Your Posts section above. Review all your posts and things youre tagged in Ever been tagged in an embarrassing photo uploaded by that distant college classmate You can use the Activity Log page and select the Posts Youre Tagged In in the left column and the Photos Photos of You also in the left column to check out what youve been tagged in. You can then remove the tag click the dropdown arrow on the left of the post or photo and then click on the the Remove Tag button at the top of the page or simply click Hide so they dont appear on your Timeline. Review your other activity on Facebook. Hitting More after Photos, Likes and Comments reveals other items that may have been automatically posted to your Timeline and your friends news feeds, including friends made, events attended, and videos watched these are embedded video posts that are separate from video apps, and isnt controlled from the Apps menu above. Some of these, such as friends made, can only be tweaked to be allowed or hidden on your Timeline. For videos watched, you can hover over the padlock to view who can see that youve watched it, or choose to delete the post. You can also Clear Video Watch History at the top of the page, and manually update privacy settings by individual posts from music, news and games apps. Click on each section to make sure that the audiences for every category of activity is ok with you. Limit the audience for your old posts for your Timeline This will revert all your previous posts from Public or Friends of Friends to just Friends. But if youve tagged a Friend in one of your posts, their Friends can see that since that is the default setting when tagging someone. Facebook Live private, friends or public For live video stream posts from your smartphone, the default setting for each video stream will be the privacy level you set for regular posts and photos. You may want to be a little less selective for live stream video if youre shooting something news worthy or if your plan is to go viral, or more selective when youre just testing something out. Either way, fire up the usual status update and select Live Video or the little red person icon. If its your first time, youll also want to grant Facebook permission to access your camera and microphone.