Facebook has completely revamped its News Feed — that big list of updates you see when you log in to Facebook — with larger images and separate feeds for different types of content.The big redesign, unveiled at an event at the company’s Menlo Park, California headquarters last Thursday, is an attempt by the company to address complaints that Facebook’s main attraction is degenerating into a jumble of monotonous musings and disjointed pictures.In an attempt to breathe new life into the News Feed, the company has introduced new controls that will allow people to sort streams of photos and other material into organised sections.With the make over, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg says he hopes to turn the News Feed into a newspaper of sorts, tailored to the particular interests of each of the social network’s more than one billion worldwide users.“What we want to do is give everyone in the world the most personalised newspaper,” Mr Zuckerberg said at the start of the event. “It should have a front page, but also let you drill down in any topic you want.”The revamped News Feed isn’t just one feed — there are several. The main one is still for your friends, but with the redesign, you will see a drop-down menu on the top right of the screen that expands to show a variety of sortable feeds. The new feature allows you to see streams of content that may feature nothing but photos or posts from your closest friends, family members of favourite businesses. Or you can just peruse content about music or sport. All of these lists are now organised by chronological order.Mr Zuckerberg explained that with the redesign, the company set out to not only create a more visually pleasing and personal experience, but to provide a consistent experience across all the places you are checking Facebook — whether on your computer, tablet or phone.The additional space being devoted to photos and videos is an acknowledgment of just how dramatically Facebook’s content has changed over the last 16 months. The company says about 50 percent of the posts on News Feed now include a photo or video now, up from 25 percent in November 2011.“We’re putting the photos front and centre so they are more visual and more immersive,” Julie Zhuo, director of design for Facebook, said at the event. Large photos will appear in the feed, and overlaid on top of them will be the test-based status update. Everything from news articles to maps to events will appear with larger photos and in a cleaner format.The growing popularity of smartphones equipped with high-quality cameras is another reason the News Feed is turning into a more visual gallery, a shift Facebook is tackling by trying to carve out more space to display photos and videos.While no one from the company addressed it at the event, the bigger pictures also mean advertisers get a larger canvas to make their marketing pitches. Facebook is hoping marketers will seize the opportunity to develop more creative ways to entice and intrigue customers so advertising can become a more acceptable fixture on the social network.The facelift is likely to be more jarring for those who only visit Facebook on a PC as it incorporates some features already deployed in the social network’s mobile applications for smartphones and tablets.Mr Zuckerberg and other speakers at the launch event stressed that the new feed will have a very consistent look across all the places you look at Facebook. Not only will the new feed appear similarly on a tablet or phone, but the left hand menu you are familiar with from Facebook’s mobile apps will be coming to the Web version.“A lot of what you’re seeing here is a very mobile-inspired Web design,” Chris Cox, vice president of product for Facebook said.The changes have received mostly positive responses from analysts.“They needed to freshen things up,” said Brian Blau, research director of consumer technologies for Gartner Inc. “This should bring a lot of cooler things” into the News Feed.“This is all about keeping people engaged,” he added.While the company has already started rolling out the new design to users, it says it is “taking a slow and measured approach” and not everyone will see it right away.Previous tweaks to the News Feed have triggered howls of protest among Facebook users. Hoping to minimise the grousing this time around, the company intends to roll out the changes in phases. It will probably be at least six months before everyone who accesses Facebook on a personal computer sees the revamped News Feed, the company said.You may be asking, “How can I get the new Facebook News Feed?” If you’re too eager and impatient to wait for the new look, then you get on the waiting list by going to facebook.com/about/newsfeed. Scroll down to the bottom of the page and click on the big green “Join Waiting List” button.And while you’re there, like us on Facebook too: facebook.com/royalgazette.bm.