Facts About The Facebook "POKE" Feature: Useful Uses

When you poke someone, a poke icon will appear on his or her Home page with the option to "Remove Poke" or "Poke Back." But what’s the meaning and use for a facebook poke ? 

What’s the Use of the Facebook POKE Button ?

Facebook : The poke feature can be used for a variety of things on Facebook. For instance, you can poke your friends to say hello. When you poke someone, they will receive a poke alert on their home page.

A previous version of Facebook’s FAQ gave additional insight into the origin of the feature, stating: "When we created the poke, we thought it would be cool to have a feature without any specific purpose. People interpret the poke in many different ways, and we encourage you to come up with your own meanings."

Wikipedia : The poke feature is intended to be a "nudge" to attract the attention of another user. Many facebook users use this feature to attract attention or say "hello" to their friends or strangers.

MakeUseof : "Poking" is basically the process of posting a message to your friend’s wall to wake them up, flirt or annoy – why couldn’t you do the same thing with a simple message? The fact is – you can. And message "poking" adds a bit of flexibility and fun to the process. As you can see – there’s no way to tell a person why you just poked them – so it’s up to the other person to read into your motivations, and of course this can lead to misunderstanding and confusion. But then again, isn’t that the fun of a social networking ?

 

Things You Didn’t Know About the POKE Feature

Although this is not confirmed, If you poke a stranger and he/she pokes back :

• You will be able to view his/her profile full even if you are not a friend.
• You can send friend request even you are not socially related (generally facebook doesn’t allow friend requests if there is no connection like mutual friends etc).

Facebook’s security feature takes into account how many mutual friends you and the person potentially receiving the request have.If you have few or no friends in common, have had previous requests marked, or a combination of the two, your request may not be sent.

So, a mutual 2 sided POKE creates a connection between 2 unrelated facebook profiles when there is no social connection like mutual friends, common interests etc.

So keep Poking … but note that in some cultures it is considered bad social etiquette.

By : Anjo