Facebook Adds Twitter-esque Public Posts

In a clear challenge to Twitter, Facebook is testing a system that allows users to publish updates for all the world to see,  Wired reports. The new feature technically allows users to restrict their content, allowing, for example, only family to see this photo or only certain friends to see that video. But the default option is to send content to the entire internet, not just Facebook friends, making status updates even more like Twitter posts.

The beta test is currently available to anyone whose profile is set to "public." Facebook has long guarded its users’ info, but this move looks like an attempt to borrow Twitter’s public thunder. It actually allows more control than Twitter, but that comes with a technical cost for Facebook; its servers will now have to track permissions on everything on the site. (More Facebook stories.)