
Introducing Paper - coolsank
https://www.facebook.com/paper
======
zyb09
Man, that video, typical marketing bullshit. First scene shows a guy writing
on a typewriter, next scene shows someone hanging up Polaroid pictures.
Seriously? Show me why this app is useful and why I need it, instead of trying
to lull me into a world that doesn't exist.

~~~
kyro
That's literally the entire point of this type of visual marketing: to help
you envision a fantasy world that's attainable with a particular product.

Apple, BMW, Chanel, etc, all do it.

~~~
cliveowen
It'd be better if that world was not set in the 70s. Polaroid and typewriters?
Who the hell has even seen them in person?

~~~
JonnieCache
Erm, people who were alive in the seventies, maybe?

Have you really never laid eyes on a typewriter?

~~~
pikachu_is_cool
I have only seen a typewriter and used it once; and that was because it was my
fathers and he wanted to show it off to me. I have never, ever, ever seen one
in public.

------
austenallred
I'm not sure why so many are describing this as a "news" app - it's pretty
obviously a refresh of the Facebook design, and a much-needed one at that.

At the given time 25% of Facebook is taken up by various buttons and controls;
there's a lot you can do and a lot of places you can navigate to from
Facebook's homepage. It was obviously designed for desktop, and then ported
over to mobile. After a couple refreshes the app was usable, but not exactly
an enjoyable experience. So "Paper" is how Facebook would look if it were
driven by designers and mobile first (if you need any more evidence that this
was very design-driven, look at the marketing video. Typewriters, polaroids,
naked woman in bathtub, lens flares and blur... it is, in a word, "hipster.")
They also seem to have knocked off Flipboard a little bit and let you see
collections of other stories. We'll see how well that takes off, but my
assumption is that since it was barely mentioned it will be a minor factor in
the new app, and I can't see myself using it.

The big move is from a lot of buttons and toggles on a screen to a more
"swipe-friendly" UI/UX. That makes sense for mobile, but it's a big change.
Something like that has to be intuitive, or it's a nightmare to use.

It's important to note that in Facebook's earnings call yesterday it revealed
that mobile revenue surpassed desktop revenue for the first time ever. This
new app has stories big, beautiful, and in-your-face. That means that ads will
be the same way, and will likely drive a premium price. Brilliant in terms of
monetization from the Facebook team.

~~~
cliveowen
I have to agree, in fact I wonder why would they even bother marketing it as a
way to share and collect stories instead of proposing it as a more visual
alternative to the main app.

I have the feeling that at Facebook they tend to half-ass things, like Home or
the redesigned Newsfeed. They release an half-baked product and then let it
rot for months with sporadic under-the-hood updates (I actually wonder why the
hell every single day the main app needs a 10MB update to do what yesterday
could do without problems, but that's for another time).

~~~
amaks
>> I have the feeling that at Facebook they tend to half-ass things, like Home
or the redesigned Newsfeed.

That's their motto, is it not? "Move fast and break things". It's hard to
expect anything well designed with an engineering attitude like this.

------
sambeau
I wonder what 53 will make of Facebook's choice of App name?

[http://www.fiftythree.com/paper](http://www.fiftythree.com/paper)

~~~
nicholassmith
I can't see that being confusing _at all_. A little bit sloppy from Facebook
to be honest, it seems like they've gotten around it as Paper (by 53) is iPad
only and Paper (by Facebook) is iPhone only.

If anyone from Facebook is reading, Paperbook. Problem solved.

EDIT: There's a Universal app called Paper as well.

~~~
Touche
5 letter common words can be used freely by anyone, in my opinion. If you want
your brand to be distinctive and searchable, pick a distinctive and searchable
name.

There was an article a few weeks ago about an internal struggle going on
inside Facebook about what their product should be. Some executives are
worried that it's primarily shallow (in their minds) content. They want to get
rid of the memes and have people sharing more "quality" content. This is a
step in that direction. They want Facebook to become the replacement to the
daily newspaper. Hence Paper.

~~~
blueblob
Are you making a comment about "candy?"

~~~
Touche
Don't know what that means, so no.

~~~
blueblob
King.com, makers of Candy Crush Saga trademarked the word "Candy."

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7090913](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7090913)

------
RyanZAG
I'm impressed by how much CPU this website is able to use. It pegged all 8
cores at 100% while I had the website open on firefox/win7

~~~
weddpros
Looks a lot like a bug somewhere in Chrome...

Wandering on the site, CPU goes back to normal after some time, but I couldn't
find what the problem is with simple inspection (JS profiling says 99% idle).

Bug reproduced on Chrome.

Safari, which uses mp4 instead of webm, works fine :-)

~~~
enneff
The GP said "firefox/win7".

~~~
weddpros
I just checked: Firefox is also using the webm version of the video. It's just
a strong hint, not a proof.

------
meshko
I watched the video. I don't understand what paper is. Actually, the only
reason I watched it was because I somehow confused myself into thinking this
was Amazon. When I was done with the video, I finally realized this is
Facebook and it all made sense. I still don't know what "paper" is of course.
Now I need my coffee.

~~~
giarc
One feature I think was not as prominent as could be was the addition of non-
Facebook stories in the app. You could see they guy add "Headlines" into his
feed. I think it pulls from some news agency. I think this is Facebook's
response to Flipboard (Flipbook?).

------
jccalhoun
When did "beautiful storytelling" become code for "a big picture near the top
and then plain text on a white background?"

~~~
InclinedPlane
You've got to understand things in context. The world of web design and of app
design has typically been a cluttered and ugly mess where typography and clean
design have been pushed to the wayside in favor of trying to cram more stuff
into user's eyes (often in service to advertising dollars). In that world
boring design that has little going for it other than cleanliness and good
lines becomes "beautiful".

~~~
pessimizer
Or, rather, usability, generic sans-serif, and having everything above the
fold was valued more than typography and clean design.

------
kyro
I'm excited to give this a spin, and that's saying a lot considering I haven't
touched FB in a few years now. It's nice to see them innovating with new ideas
and products, instead of iterating on their existing main platform.

What's interesting is that their mobile strategy involves grabbing as much of
your screen real estate as possible, with the FB app, FB Messenger, Instagram,
and now Paper. I guess that was obvious when they tried the whole Facebook
phone thing.

~~~
mattlutze
It looks like a different interface on the concept that Flipboard is built
around, using Facebook content instead of select news sources.

It's a neat interface, and I hope it's light enough on the hardware that it'll
be as fluid as in the video (on my iPhone 4 and One S the standard Facebook
app has become slow and laggy).

But, it looks like an interface that distances the user from the content,
enforcing a more consumption-focused model of interaction than producer, which
seems a little antithetical.

~~~
0x0
This looks like a direct clone of Flipboard! Flipboard supports fetching from
your personal facebook feed, and this new facebook thing seems to support
fetching from various public "interests" feeds too.

------
quaffapint
Does seem like a fluid UXD. Shame android is second class citizen again, and
you have to be on facebook to use it.

Hopefully if it does pan out as well as the video shows, other apps like
flipboard will start incorporating its flow.

~~~
eigenvector
I admit I didn't watch the video (couldn't, it managed to lock up my 6-core
workstation), but isn't this basically Home for iOS?

[https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.facebook.h...](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.facebook.home)

------
tremendo
Pretty. I like the UI innovative touches for flipping through content, panning
pictures, etc. The video does a good job of selling it. Alas, not for me.

It seems to me a type of app better suited perhaps to the tablet format.
Personally I'm over consuming content like this on my phone. In most cases I
may skim something quickly and if it really catches my attention then I'll
wait until I'm on a bigger screen to explore it further.

The Share section tries to make the point of "the most important stories… your
own" and it's a good one, well presented. From my own personal experience
though I believe that most of the people I follow online, whether prolific or
not, will not dedicate a lot of time to "production" work as in selecting
headlines, backgrounds for those headers, more than a couple of beautiful
pictures (they never really come out as good as presented), etc. to create a
flip-book like these. This will be a good medium for… commercial producers? as
shown, the CNNs, Time magazines, of course the Verge, Engadgenet, etc, and
that's what I'd end up consuming only to finally uninstall.

But I know, that's just me, and my 2 cents.

------
yanivt
What a bunch of grumpy old men. I bet everybody sitting here taking shots at
this app 1) have never created anything nearly as cool 2) would not have
understood Apple in its hayday 3) spend too much time reading and taking shots
at other people's work.

I'm all for being cynical and questioning what's out there but you have to let
the good stuff through. The design here is first class. The Facebook guys have
outdone themselves. Yes, it's a culmination of a large body of work that's
come before with a few novel improvements. That's how art works. Quit bitching
and do something useful.

/rantoff

~~~
xauronx
Yeah, it's getting kind of old scrolling past 1200 pixels of cynical foot
stomping and grumbling before getting to anything relevant to the post. Yes,
we needed all of that insightful talk about how bad hipsters suck and how
marketing _grumble grumble grumble_.

I'm not convinced that I like Facebook or any of my friends content enough to
want ANOTHER channel of absorbing it. However, the app seems to be beautifully
executed and the marketing page is pretty flawless. Some of the memory
concerns aside, I love when companies create those kinds of landing pages.
Like this one: [http://www.knocktounlock.com/](http://www.knocktounlock.com/)

~~~
tbirdz
Unrelated comment, but why is it becoming a design trend now to hide the
scrollbars on websites? Luckily I accidentally hit the space bar, so I saw
there was more content there, but without that I would have had no idea there
was more information. I've seen this happen on a number of sites, so I don't
think it's just Chrome failing to render the site. I just don't understand
what possible reason there could be to deliberately hide the scroll bar.

------
joe_the_user
Hmm,

Of my 300+ Facebook friends, one guy consistently posts the stereotypical
millenial thing described here of "beautiful hike on the coast with Sharon".
If someone else started doing that, I'd probably have to cut one of them off.

Fewer friends seem to have real pictures of themselves and more have cartoons,
cats and memes.

This format looks great for presenting what people imagine as a great Facebook
post. But I actually think the majority of people don't use Facebook for this
- the hippest are already off Facebook and, well, good riddance.

~~~
gfosco
There's so much more to Paper than your existing news feed.

~~~
joe_the_user
Putting aside the marketing-blather tone of your post, what is this "more"?

Who would create this "more"?

The nice thing about my existing news feed is that it is created by the people
I either know or have a rather specific affinity to. Either way, they create
stuff that actually is interesting _specifically_ to me. And only about 5-10
of them are capable of producing video or the equvilent. Most produce essays,
quips, collages and cat-pictures - not stuff with huge production values or
stuff with a cinematic or whatever tone. Just _relevant_ things.

So what would be added? Ipso facto irrelevant stuff.

~~~
gfosco
When you get to play with it next week, you'll understand. Newsfeed is one
section, and you can choose from a variety of others to flip through. They
will be curated and high quality. See recent posts like:
[http://recode.net/2014/01/27/facebook-is-seeking-editors-
for...](http://recode.net/2014/01/27/facebook-is-seeking-editors-for-news-
app/)

~~~
joe_the_user
Will the curators be as obtusely disconnected from their readers as your
replies to my posts have been?

I mean, my argument is that there is fundamental difference, a wide gulf,
between a feed of friends' posts and a curated stream of news article, even if
some friend's posts contain some links.

A friend might, say, object to my argument using a counter-argument whereas,
for example, a marketing bot would respond with a stream of text all of which
is synonymous with "don't worry, it will be great".

~~~
gfosco
If all you want is a feed of your friends posts, then you have the Facebook
app.

I'm not a marketing bot... I work on the Parse team. You asked two questions
in your response, I answered them.

All I said originally is that it's more than just newsfeed. It was not my
intention to argue a point, simply to clarify. Oh, and don't worry, it will be
great.

------
blueskin_
Worst info site ever. I can't even tell what it is.

An app? a model of phone? a website? a new facebook feature?

~~~
Dirlewanger
It's a fancy new UI, that's it. Doesn't look like there will be much content
change, just how it's laid out. Boring.

------
jere
>Explore and share stories from friends and the world around you.

Stories...? Or memes and ads?

~~~
duiker101
Or pictures of food and selfies at the club?

~~~
Fuzzwah
Get new friends?

------
vkb
I've been blogging for over five years. I'm also an avid Facebook user in that
I try to post statuses that are interesting and relevant to my audience
instead of just the usual "I ate a grilled cheese for lunch and now I feel
feelings about it". I also, as of recently, ironically own a typewriter and I
am working on a novel. Basically, I love creating content.

Theoretically, I am the target market for this product because it's supposed
to lure me into divulging more longform-ish content to Facebook and creating
narratives about it.

I was completely repelled by the ad, not only because I still don't see how
this product differentiates from Facebook_regular, but because of the vast
array of hipsters doing things that have nothing to do with actual Facebook.
If you like photography and animation and writing in the Real World, why would
you want to move that content to Facebook? If you create content digitally,
why would you want to do it on anything except for a platform you own?

Moreover, I was horrified to see that woman not only Facebooking ("Papering?")
in the bathtub, but sharing pictures of her fetus, which could then be
enlarged by anyone who cares enough.

2014\. What a world.

~~~
sp332
Lots of people put ultrasound pics of their future kids on Facebook. It's not
even that weird, considering the emotional intensity that picture must have
for the poster.

~~~
vkb
I agree that lots of people do it, and they do it to foster an emotional
reaction, and that sharing ultrasounds with people close to you is a very
positive experience.

But I feel uneasy that we're encouraging this kind of privacy invasion from
the very beginning, that leads to things like this[1]. The piece is, of
course, reductio ad absurdum, but not completely out of the realm of the
ordinary.

[1] [http://www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/a-mommy-bloggers-
lament](http://www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/a-mommy-bloggers-lament)

~~~
wmeredith
Uh, your source for "where this all leads" is satirical fiction.

~~~
vkb
I don't have a source, because most of the young kids whose lives have been
shared without their consent have been having their lives shared for less than
10 years (Facebook started in 2004 and was rolled out to the general public in
2006 [1]), so we'll have to wait before academic studies start coming out on
the topic of oversharing.

I am coming at the topic anecdotally (where sites like STFUParents[2] exist
for people who are tired of overshare or people who have been fired or
arrested for things they shared on social networks come into play.)

If anyone has links that either prove or disprove that sharing pictures of
small children/sonograms is beneficial, I would be really interested in seeing
them.

I just tend to skew towards guarded when it comes to sharing private medical
information and pictures, especially of minors who don't have a say in whether
you do or not.

[1][https://www.facebook.com/notes/facebook/welcome-to-
facebook-...](https://www.facebook.com/notes/facebook/welcome-to-facebook-
everyone/2210227130) [2][http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/on-
parenting/post/stfu-p...](http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/on-
parenting/post/stfu-parents-an-addictive-blog/2012/01/13/gIQAHNpGuQ_blog.html)

------
erikb
this looks like an idea that was tried so many times and people just don't
care. I think about smart tags in GMail here, or circles. Most people simply
don't micromanage their data flows according to topics. Maybe I simply don't
get the difference here, but if I am right, then I am deeply disappointed and
frustrated to see people spend money and smart developers' time into ideas
that already failed years ago.

~~~
lambada
I think the difference here is that Facebook will categorise all the content.
in effect they will manage what goes into the Tech or news or Creativity
buckets. You just say which you want to see by default.

~~~
icoder
I understood that part as if there will be content especially for Paper,
categorised (by creator) and readable for everyone. If they actually think
they can categorise the stuff that is now my Facebook experience and get
anything close to what is seen in the video, I'd be pleasantly surprised.

------
danabramov
Are we already out of original app names?

~~~
blowski
At least they didn't call it 'Papr'.

~~~
jffry
ppr.io

------
grey-area
Some beautiful design and thoughtful UI in the app here, and this is also a
lovely microsite - I love the use of the video full screen. It'd be great to
see some of this sort of thoughtful design go into the UI of web browsers on
mobile platforms (which are also platforms for reading and sharing stories).

Shame it's from Facebook.

~~~
pavs
Why is it shame its from facebook? FB has been at the forefront of awesome UI
design concepts for al long time, specifically in mobile.

~~~
grey-area
Because I don't trust them with my data.

~~~
xauronx
Also because no one on my feed posts anything I'm actually interested in. If I
could get that UI on hacker news, I would be pleased.

~~~
MarkTee
Would Flipboard work for that?

[http://flip.it/5pPct](http://flip.it/5pPct)

------
danielbraun
Great! Yet another innovative way to view cat pictures and selfies. It's funny
how the users in the video aren't even reading their stories.

------
krelian
I can't wait for the next trend in app/services marketing. I'm tired of:

Introducing %word% , bla bla bla beautiful bla bla bla Share. Coupled with
short sentences over a huge iOS/ OS X images.

It feels as if this has been here forever.

~~~
ianstormtaylor
Is it really all that different from some of the iconic ads[1] from the 1950s?
Seems like it's mostly the same story-telling technique but slightly tweaked
to take advantage of video and interaction. I wonder if it won't really change
(apart from new tech which makes it just routing similarly-structured stories
directly into your brain or something) because the kinds of stores we react
two isn't really evolving that quickly either.

[1]: [http://media.fontsinuse.com/static/use-media-
items/7/6475/fu...](http://media.fontsinuse.com/static/use-media-
items/7/6475/full-800x1015/502fea1b/thinksmall.jpeg)

------
S_A_P
Regardless of the FB hate that seems to be spreading in this forum the app
itself has a lot to appreciate. Im not a facebook user, and I'm not sure how
much of this will really get used by the average facebook user. However, this
iOS app appears to be very well done, and if it behaves as well as the demo
shows is a nice benchmark for mobile app UX. It actually makes me want to
start digging into the new iOS 7 APIs.

------
Nate630
Yet another way to view text, images, and video. For me, really comes down to
the content. Does the content interest me? - I can't tell by the site.

~~~
kayoone
Well the content is created by your facebook friends.

~~~
marknutter
So, then.. no?

------
hrktb
It's funny they choose to tease it, instead of aving an 'get it now' call to
action from day one [edit: I would have tried it now as I see it for the first
time, I'm not sure I'll care for another content feed app in 3 days,
especially as it will have discussed to death in meantime]. And I don't get
the link between the name and the app. Is it paper as in newspaper ?

------
robodale
The same pompous shit that come from these companies. Holy fuck I don't care.

------
leoplct
Flipboard should be very excited about it :) #sarcasm

------
gagege
The video was choppy and froze part way through. Seems to happen to me a lot
with these types of websites. On different computers, even.

~~~
rplnt
I tried three different browsers. Opera was very laggy, Chrome just showed one
frame and Firefox was moderately laggy. Resizing the tab helped a bit. Audio
was choppy as well. My HW specs are far from low (though it is not a gaming
machine either).

I couldn't pause the video, fast forward it or even see any indicator of
progress. I didn't even expect volume settings.

Considering all this, the page is simply horrible. It might look nice (on
paper perhaps), but the UX is the worst. Visuals alone don't make good sites.

~~~
oldstrangers
Use this video then. [https://fbcdn-dragon-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-
prn1/t39.2365...](https://fbcdn-dragon-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-
prn1/t39.2365/851559_578934018851295_1147417154_n.mp4)

------
jackmaney
Garbage like this actually has an effect on me that's the exact opposite of
what's intended: I will, under no circumstances whatsoever, ever use any
product from Facebook with the name "paper" in it.

[http://theoatmeal.com/comics/sell_generation](http://theoatmeal.com/comics/sell_generation)

------
GeorgeMac
Is it me, or is it just facebook with news feeds and a nice big handful of
gestures. Their must be a massive increase in RSI due to hundreds of
apps/interfaces with different gesture controls. I don't know if my muscle
memory has anymore room for this app. Im going to end up loosing important
things, like konami codes...

------
liamgooding
Sucks to be Jason Calacanis right now, who JUST launch "Inside" app that
basically tries to do this - [http://techcrunch.com/2014/01/27/inside-mobile-
news-launch/](http://techcrunch.com/2014/01/27/inside-mobile-news-launch/)

~~~
yanivt
Yeah, he's actually talked quite a bit about how Facebook constantly takes out
startups and you never know when you're going to be next. What tragic luck!
Hope he pulls through.

------
plg
The underlying assumption at FB seems to be that people are interested in
(something like a) magazine but one curated not by professional journalists,
designers and advertisers but rather curated by uncle joe, grandma bessie,
etc. I know which magazine I'd rather read.

------
urs2102
As a new frontend programmer, what kind of libraries did Facebook use to
create a page like this with full screen video/the "explore" page which has
thumb moving on it? Was it a type of JS? Was it Flash? Just wondering...

~~~
cs02rm0
The video and the moving thumb (also a video) use the HTMl5 video tag and some
CSS to make it fullscreen.

------
brandonmcane
So, for one, I had to watch the video twice to try to figure out what the app
actually does. Though, I suppose maybe that's just my own ineptitude. Because
I'm still not sure what it does.

Secondly, what is the market for this? I can already make my own "paper" type
thing with Flipboard or the myriad other options on the market. Considering
this seems like something I need to not only download, but take time to
customize, does Facebook expect people to switch right on over to them?

Why can't I just go on Facebook or Twitter and see what stories my friends are
sharing? That's the point, isn't it? I don't get it.

------
maaarghk
When the girl in the bath came on screen I remembered I was watching a video
of a bunch of people who are addicted to their f'ing iPhones. And then I felt
like I was watching an episode of Black Mirror.

------
dublinben
Here's the source video on Vimeo:
[http://vimeo.com/85421325](http://vimeo.com/85421325)

For some reason I was redirected there in IE11, after both Firefox and Chrome
crashed.

------
mayankkumar
Take that, Princeton report!

~~~
hoektoe
if it's on paper, it ARE true

------
exodust
Can't we wait for it to exist and then talk about it?

Who knows whether it will be intuitive or not. Can't tell from that video. My
phone isn't as still as the one in the video,

I don't like too much swiping of little bits and pieces all the time. Tap,
swipe, all day long.. just show me the content and stop making a zilion forks
in the road. You're making me put my hand in front of the screen every 2
seconds, it looks like hard work to me... all that swiping and endless mashup
of random stuff.

Is it news? Is it noise? Is it noisy news?

------
matthuggins
Curious to see what this is since the video left me fucking clueless!

------
k-mcgrady
According to The Verge not only is this iPhone only - it's US ONLY! Seriously
a news reader app limited by location. Can anyone come up with a half sane
reason they are doing that?

------
andyjohnson0
Is this a native app or a web app running in a browser? I watched the video
(at work, so without sound) and I can't tell. If its browser based then I'm
extremely impressed.

~~~
stillmotion
It's native. Zuckerberg has self-proclaimed Facebook to be "a mobile company."

~~~
blueblob
My girlfriend found it frustrating that she can attach a picture to a facebook
post in the browser (even on mobile) but can't in the app.

~~~
ceejayoz
I can do that in the app (iOS) just fine... and not just on posts, comments
too.

------
jamesmoss
Anybody know how they kept the phone so still in those videos? The hand
holding it doesn't move. Is there a pole underneath attaching it to a surface
we can't see?

~~~
Jakob
It looks like most of it is an image, with an animation put inside:
[https://fbcdn-dragon-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-
prn1/t39.2365...](https://fbcdn-dragon-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-
prn1/t39.2365/851578_399356030210669_1142938113_n.webm)

------
JungleNavigator
On the first time, I wondered how the Paper creators manage to create a
Facebook page without the Facebook branding, then realized it is Facebook's
thing :-)

------
CSDude
Why name it Paper since it is just another UI for a subset of Facebook's
features? You can comment, like, view posts, and only the new thing is
categories. It is almost everything you do on Facebook, once you can upload
something, it can be called a new UI for Facebook, replacing the old one. Why
confuse with Paper? Now I have two apps for Facebook, one for reading one for
writing, great.

------
ecesena
Reading the (few) details, it seems pretty poor at algorithmic level, in the
sense of how it choose the stories _for you_.

I wonder what the best strategy is, while in the past we had ugly interfaces
with interesting algos (e.g., reddit), now it seems there's just UX/UI... my
question is: is this a viable solution? Can you build UX first, and then
complete it with better algos?

------
1angryhacker
because what we need right now is another way to view our facebook feed

------
rrggrr
This reminds me of drop.io - a company Facebook purchased several years ago. I
suspect Lessin, one of the founders and a writer played a role in this very
polished storytelling metaphor for what amounts to content integration and
sharing utility. If they carryover the phone, chat and other mediums from
drop.io they may have something.

------
hasanatkazmi
Facebook is trying get in the market of successful concepts like Flipboard and
Pulse. Why wouldn't Facebook like to mine what people (and their 'Friends')
'like' and show them relevant news when Flipboard and Pulse connect to your
Facebook, churn what you shared in the past and show you news which you might
like.

------
zacharyz
It looks beautiful - which is what I have come to expect from the designers
over there at facebook. I love how Mike and Sharon's trips are used in their
marketing materials, it is a nice personal touch.

The facebook timeline is starting to feel extremely stale - if facebook can
make it so its users can tell better stories then I am all for it.

------
whizzkid
I am happy that their next thing is totally useless since my facebook usage is
really really rare for last 6 months!

------
smrtinsert
I was wondering why they chose such an awful keyboard and then I realized I
was looking at an ios device, crazy.

------
SeanKilleen
Quick suggestion: a reminder that this app is coming. Rather than tell me to
share it, remember that February 3 is days away and I'm not really inspired to
put it on my calendar. would have been great to see a request to get notified
on launch via my choice of social network / e-mail.

------
phwd
Instead of pulling information from the marketing page, why not just read the
PR release instead [http://newsroom.fb.com/News/793/Introducing-Paper-Stories-
fr...](http://newsroom.fb.com/News/793/Introducing-Paper-Stories-from-
Facebook)

~~~
icoder
From that article: "Paper is the first product from Facebook Creative Labs,
where we’re crafting new apps to support the diverse ways people want to
connect and share." -> Put things a bit in perspective for me.

------
revetkn
The product is probably not for me but it looks like FB employs some talented
iOS engineers

------
dudus
I don't see a lot of difference from Google Play Newsstand or Flipboard.

------
kyriakos
I hope this runs well on android.. considering how bad their android app

~~~
joeblau
It's alternating. Android users got Facebook Home last year, this year iPhone
users get Facebook Paper.

I think that's fair.

~~~
kyriakos
Paper will eventually come out for Android. Facebook Home obviously is not
something that can run on iOS due to its limitations.

------
nathanbarry
This looks like the work of Mike Matas and the rest of the team from Push Pop
Press. Nice to see them be able to work on a full experience like this after
being acquired by Facebook.

~~~
nakedgremlin
Agreed. A lot of the interactions shown matches previous Push Pop work (some
almost exactly -- page to image to full screen). But I do find it odd that
it'll take them close to four years (from acquisition) to get this to market.

------
ajays
It's all about advertising.

Being able to deliver rich, full-screen stories to you implies being able to
deliver rich, full-screen video ads to you. And that's where the money is.

------
cheshire137
Why announce now if it's not available till February? I suppose if the news
sites inundate me with more articles about this app, I'll remember to try it
out.

------
jesalg
So if you share something on Paper would it also show up on Facebook? I can't
tell if Paper is a new platform/app or just another way of browsing Facebook.

------
miles_matthias
I don't understand why this is some big, ground shaking app.

This is what the Facebook app itself should be. Instead of improving their
terrible news feed, they make this.

~~~
jesbickhart
Facebook will always need a home page if for no other reason than to manage
who you friend and what you are reading. They are interested in creating more
stand alone apps ala Messenger. Paper is just another stand alone facebook app
- and looks to be a very good one to me.

------
icoder
Wonder how much the experience would degrade with a lesser internet
connection. Even WiFi probably won't keep up with that, but perhaps enough.
But 3G?

------
aseem
I think this is another prime example of building a vitamin instead of
building a medicine. Do I really need this? How is this different from
FlipBoard?

------
mertd
Kind of funny that the page is broken on iPad (Safari).

------
dmarusic16
My favorite thing about the demo video is how its completely bereft of ads.
That probably won't be the case in practice—at least not for long.

~~~
oesmith
Exactly my first thought too!

------
terhechte
I'm getting weird video display issues on iPhone 5S:

[https://posts.app.net/21220141](https://posts.app.net/21220141)

------
tdj
Does anyone have a good explanation for why the pages uses 1-frame videos for
static pictures? Does WebM offer better quality-per-KB than JPEG?

------
Multiplayer
Did anyone else laugh out loud when they panned to a naked woman in a bath
tub? I was like, woah, starting to get a little weird here.

------
Fuzzwah
That video was painful for me to watch due to the jerky motions of the camera
combined with weird video glitches in my Chrome window.

------
emehrkay
I enjoy Mike Matas' work [http://www.mikematas.com](http://www.mikematas.com)

~~~
prezjordan
Wow this guy's done everything!

------
garypezza
I'm sorry, but haven't we moved past the phase of things like tilting the
phone to view the full photo?

------
cushychicken
Does it still read my text messages? Yes? Then it won't be on my phone, just
like the original shitty app.

------
bovermyer
What happens if I think the concept is interesting, if only because a sound
plays when you tap the Like button?

------
coreymgilmore
Interesting....not sure of the overall usefulness. Let's see how this develops
after a few months.

------
mathattack
I noticed that Facebook now has a trending feature. It seems like another move
to fight Twitter.

------
yanivt
Does anyone know how they do the full bleed animation? (show the user flicking
through scenes)?

------
stef25
First thing I thought of was Storify, I guess it's a different kind of story
telling.

------
eyeareque
On my phone I saw: Please use portrait mode... Play video. Plays landscape
format video.

------
Bahamut
This website really is not desktop friendly - it was annoying to browse
through it.

------
fjabre
So this is what they're doing with all that cash? Color me unimpressed.

------
cycojesus
Is it just me or the perspective of that image looks very wrong?

------
nlp
Very buggy on my iPad.

------
cs02rm0
Looks like Facebook without adverts. An improvement but...

------
narfz
it's nice to see mike matas' again. i really felt in love with his UI skills

([http://mikematas.com](http://mikematas.com))

~~~
nfoz
I clicked that link and my web browser gave me a type of popup I didn't think
it could, declaring: "This is a next generation website that is best viewed in
an advanced web browser such as Apple's Safari. You will be able to view the
site using this browser but the performance may be poor."

Then my browser nearly died before I could close the tab.

~~~
scholia
Got the same message with Firefox 26, but the site worked fine. However, it
did make me think the guy was a dick....

------
adaam2
Style over substance

------
cykho
It's now available for download from the link.

------
crorella
I failed to see the practicality of the app.

------
nelmaven
Do the adds also come in fullscreen?

------
donniezazen
So mobile is winning.

------
fakeanon
Prettier Facebook.

------
mafuba
Flipboard FTW!

------
iAinsley
inside.com does this!

------
rubyfan
Meh

