Facebook update brings threaded comments for Pages

Facebook announced today that the social network now permits individual comment replies — aka threaded comments — on all Pages.

With an update that has been in the works since November, readers are now able to directly reply to comments made on Page content. The new feature is designed to facilitate conversation with Page administrators, fans, and others.

The comment replies are tailored to favor popularity; the most active replies and discussions will automatically move to the top, enabling Page visitors to view the most thoughtful and relevant conversation.

The comment format is limited to two branches; you can’t reply to a reply, in other words.

The order for comments and conversation threads is based on relevance to the reader and might appear differently to each person. For instance, positive feedback and user connections might move the conversation higher. Comments left by friends of a user would be visible at the top. Negative feedback may result in down-ranking the comments due to spam reports or “marks-as-spam” made by the Page owner.

This feature is now available for all Facebook Pages. Administrators can activate Page Replies by accessing “Manage Permissions” on the admin panel. You can opt-out at anytime, but all Pages will have this feature enabled on July 10. The feature will automatically activate for profiles with more than 10,000 followers.

Prior to launch, different methods of using this feature were tested with popular Facebook pages including sourcing questions from fans, hosting topical conversations, and open question and answer sessions.

The interface update has received positive reviews from users. At this time, the feature is only available for desktop, but will be available in Facebook Graph API and mobile applications in the future.