When Facebook rolled out its ‘Facebook Home’ app, it arrived with a lot of fanfare. However, the app failed to gain much traction after the launch. Despite that, the social network is not ready to give up on it and has now rolled out a new version of the app.

The new version is still in the beta phase and has been rolled out to Android beta testers for now. The most significant upgrade that the new version packs is the support for folders.

Users can easily create and manage new folders in Facebook Home. To create a new folders, you simply need to drag one app on top of the other. Once the folders have been created, you can add them to Facebook Home’s app drawer to be able to organize them neatly.

Whenever you wish to access the folders, you can move straight to the app drawer and open the desired folder. Other notable features that are a part of the updated app include the ability to share News Feed stories in private messages as well as use chat and access bookmarks. Not only that, you can also save your Facebook Android app on your smartphone or tablet’s microSD card.

Facebook has been quietly working on a service, internally called Reader, that displays content from Facebook users and publishers in a new visual format tailored for mobile devices. The project, which the company has been developing for more than a year, is designed to showcase news content in particular. Recent versions of Reader resemble Flipboard, a smartphone and tablet app that aggregates stories from multiple sources and lets users swipe to flip through articles, said people with knowledge of the project.

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Want to understand how Facebook connects its servers? Hear from VMware’s CEO how the virtualization giant plans to build its next big business? Discover why Snapchat builds on Google App Engine as opposed to Amazon Web Services? Or maybe you want to understand if Microsoft can compete in the cloud.

We’re going to have people discussing all this and more on Wednesday and Thursday at this week’s Structure conference in San Francisco. In the sixth year of the event we’re spending a lot of our time delving into the practical matters of building out webscale infrastructure, from the networking conundrums to the business process around scaling.

If there’s one big theme for the show this year, it’s what happens when IT meets the business and how to bring an understanding of business goals to scaling out services, whether you are Amazon or Revlon. We’ll have Kevin Scott of LinkedIn sharing how he re-architected the business social network’s infrastructure to better meet business goals. Cory von Wallenstein of Dyn will discuss the process the company follows to support existing features while building new ones that must scale rapidly without breaking the service or the bank.

We’ll also have executives from Warner Music Group sharing how the company is building out an internal platform as a service and what it will do for the business, while CIOs from Revlon, Kohl’s and The Clorox Company share their takes on the cloud from inside the enterprise.

Networking nerds from web giants will be there discussing the importance of using software defined networks and real-time information for building application aware networks. Plus, we have several talks from people such as Jeff Dean of Google, Jason Hoffman of Joyent and Adrian Cockcroft of Netflix  that will discuss how to push our infrastructure’s boundaries for the data-rich era we’re entering.

We’ll also have ten three-minute talks from our Cloud Trailblazers who will be there ready to talk about their ideas for how to rethink infrastructure. You can meet the stars of tomorrow over the course of the two-day event. Or you can network with the stars of today. Plus, two hot startups will debut and there’s also a six-company LaunchPad with very young startups.

I’m preparing to get on a plane from Austin to spend this week in San Francisco. I’ve made this trip dozens of times for dozens of GigaOM events, but this one has me the most excited. We’ve pulled some amazing people together to talk not just about defining the cloud or various trends in infrastructure, but how the shift in information technology is playing out at real companies whether they are startups, enterprises or the giants of the webscale world.

We have a few tickets left, so just sign up and get on over to the event. This isn’t some wannabe cloud show. This is Structure, the first and the best cloud show planned by myself, Derrick Harris, Barb Darrow and the GigaOM events team. We wouldn’t let you down.

Google Reader is meeting its end in just a few weeks, and there’s no doubt it’ll be traumatic for users of the beloved service. There are a variety of replacement options already on the market, with more expected to launch in the next couple of weeks, and I’m curious to see what rises to the top.

But one replacement product that I wouldn’t use? An RSS news reader from Facebook.

In one sense, it wouldn’t be surprising for Facebook to launch an RSS reader at its press event next Thursday in Menlo Park, as some people have speculated. Anyone using Google Reader has to find a replacement by July 1, and it’s still a pretty wide-open market. Products like Feedly seem to have a head start, but there’s still time for someone to roll out a new product and win over users.

We’ve seen that Facebook has no problem quickly launching products to try to disrupt a growing market, even if it’s not a sure thing they’ll succeed. (Just look at Poke, the company’s challenge to Snapchat.) And between the company’s launch of hashtags last week to improve the real-time nature of the news feed (even if I think hashtags are better saved for ironic conversation), and the addition of new tabs for following people on the new News Feed, Facebook clearly has ambitions to be more of a resource for news. (After all, brands and advertisers love the real-time nature of constantly updated live events and news.)

But as a hardcore Google Reader user, I have no interest in using an RSS reader replacement from Facebook, and there are several reasons why it seems like an ill-suited product for the social platform.

The appeal of Google Reader was that it was a reliable tool for importing and consuming news — one that wasn’t influenced by trends. When I subscribe to a feed, I want to read everything in that feed. With Twitter and Facebook at my disposal, I don’t need another site to see articles that my friends are sharing. I rely on my RSS feeds for work to catch every item of technology news flowing across the internet every day — I need to see everything, not just what’s popular, to do my job. And I follow probably 20-30 blogs about topics like fashion or cooking, where the writers post infrequently but where want to read every one of their posts.

So why wouldn’t I look to Facebook to re-create this experience? Probably because I don’t want my RSS reader to be social — I have Twitter and the existing Facebook for social news. I don’t want all my friends to know that I read fashion blogs on a daily basis. I don’t want the news I read to influence the ads I see on Facebook, or the stories that show up in my news feed. As the Washington Post’s auto-sharing from its social reader experiment showed, people don’t want everyone to know what they’re reading.

Of course, we don’t know if Facebook is launching an RSS reader at all, let alone what it would look like. The company did not have any comment on the matter when we asked. But social sharing is embedded in Facebook’s DNA, so it’s a reasonable assumption that any RSS reader put out by Facebook would have serious social attributes, with a heavy emphasis on sharing.

Sure, there’s room for social news on Facebook. On my account, I “like” a lot of news outlets, as well as journalists and celebrities and business figures. In fact, a quick glance at my news feed would show mostly news stories, and very few posts from my friends. It’s a great way to see what’s popular right now in the news, or to catch an older story I might have missed on Twitter. But social news is a distinctly different experience from what people knew and loved about Google Reader — and that’s a distinction that a company like Digg seems to understand.

As I wrote previously, Digg’s new RSS news reader will likely incorporate some social features but will also serve as a separate product from the popular stories posted on Digg.com. And while Google Reader used to have much-beloved social features, these were complements, not a replacement, for the feeds themselves.

Would it make perfect sense for Facebook to create a dedicated spot on its site for news? Sure. But that likely wouldn’t keep me from searching for my next RSS relationship.

Facebook ads are about to become a tiny bit less obtrusive: the social network just announced that it will stop showing Sponsored Results this July. These ads have appeared alongside brands, groups and more in searches since August of last year, but Facebook made the decision to cut the program after noticing that marketers were using Sponsored Results and mobile app install ads quite similarly. Businesses will still be able to use the latter (and purportedly more effective) method, along with post links ads, when the program ends in July. In other words, don't expect a commercial-free experience.

Welcome to this morning's edition of "First To Know," a series in which we keep you in the know on what's happening in the digital world.

Today, we're looking at three particularly interesting stories. This is either the greatest or the worst news you’ve heard all day: Facebook finally incorporated hashtags. New reports indicate Apple is looking at bigger screens for iPhones, including 4.7-inch and 5.7-inch models, in addition to lower-priced versions available in a range of colors. And last but not least: Twitter shut down API v.1.

While Facebook stores haven’t worked out so well for major retailers, so-called f-commerce is still a force to be reckoned with for smaller merchants, businesses, and fashion labels. It’s also a great niche for Asian startups to serve as Facebook shop creation platforms. One such offering is Malaysia-based Square.my which has been in private beta for a year and is now running in public beta since March this year.

Quite a few Malaysian celebrities are using this startup’s f-commerce platform for their indie fashion collections, such as Mizz Nina’s Mizz Demeanor label.

The startup wants to centralize all the actions in a blogshop or Facebook store – from inventory management, to payment processes and social marketing. Square.my promises that it’s a lot more efficient, and its service is free to use.

Square.my’s goal is not only to help entrepreneurs setup their web stores at an affordable price, but also to solve the notorious e-payment issues that come with doing e-commerce in Southeast Asia. To that end, Square.my lets shoppers on its merchant partner stores use either Paypal or MOLPay. But there’s also the choice of cash transfers. That’s because, explains Square.my co-founder Luqman Adris, Malaysian online shoppers still prefer manual payments over web-based credit card purchases, so the cash transfer option enables them to pay manually through a bank/ATM deposit and upload the payment receipt to the store. So the e-payment issues are far from solved, but the choices are in place.

Indian expansion

The bootstrapping team of five at Square.my is about to expand its social commerce business to India with the aid of a local Indian partner. That will be likely wrapped up and revealed soon.

In terms of other features for merchants, Square.my offers automatic product image uploads to Facebook albums, Blogspot, and the merchant’s own website – that’s so “sellers can have multiple sales channels in addition to their Facebook shop,” explains Luqman.

It has been nearly a year since Facebook decided to go public. The IPO was marred with a number of issues, but Facebook pushed forth and is a public entity today. The first-ever meeting of Facebook’s stockholders is due to take place on June 11, and the social network has decided to webcast the event.

The stockholder meeting will discuss a number of topics which are typical to such meet-ups. For instance, personnel representing Facebook will be discussing the revenue details of the company, including income as well as profits and the future prospects. Since the meeting will mark the completion of one year with Facebook as a public company, it is expected that the company will also dish out an analysis of its performance over the entire year.

At the same time, another critically important topic that will be under discussion on June 11 meeting is the election of Facebook’s board of directors. In the invitation extended to stockholders who are due to participate in the meeting, Facebook has asked them to vote for different board members.

Among the notable candidates who are seeking election to Facebook’s board of directors are Mark Zuckerberg, Sheryl Zuckerberg, Reed Hastings, Peter Thiel and others. An exception, this year, is that of Jim Breyer, who had been on the board for the past eight years, but has decided to quit now.

If you are looking forward to this event and wish to keep tabs on any developments that take place at the event, bookmark this page.

Facebook Singapore’s office officially opened it doors almost three years ago in late 2010, and currently occupies two levels of a corporate office building around the corner of Cecil Street. Though the size of Singapore’s office might not be as huge and sprawling as its other cities’ based, it’s interesting to note how the office designers infused local Asian cultures into the architectural elements. Check out our gallery below for the pictures taken during our trip down to the office!

     

     

     

For the first time, the Republican Party has a Chief Technology Officer: outgoing Facebook Engineering Manager Andy Barkett.

As CTO, Barkett will oversee the Republican National Committee's recently announced plans to restructure itself around data and analytics. He will also be responsible for training Republican candidates and staffers on social media and technology as well as building relationships with technology leaders across the country.

“It’s essential that the Republican Party has the resources to drive voter turnout as we look toward the elections of 2014, 2016 and beyond," said Barkett in a statement. "Silicon Valley welcomes the party’s efforts to be more creative and innovative, and I look forward to helping the party accomplish these goals."

Before leaving for the RNC, Barkett oversaw dozens of Facebook engineers on six teams handling mobile infrastructure, messaging, ads, newsfeeds, platforms and payments. He previously served as senior director of engineering for Livescribe and had roles at Nvidia and Google. He's also an angel investor for several technology startups, according to the RNC.

"I am confident that with Andy’s experience and our continued efforts to build meaningful relationships with experts in Silicon Valley, we'll see the changes to this part of our operation that we all agree are both important and necessary to winning elections in the future," said RNC Chairman Reince Priebus in a statement on the hire.

Scott McNealy, former CEO of Sun Microsystems and outspoken conservative, said that Barkett will give Republicans a "huge boost" in digital messaging.

"Andy Barkett is a not just a strong advocate of fiscal conservatism and the ability of private enterprise to lift everyone in our nation, but he is the real deal as a technologist too," said McNealy.

The RNC announced it was hiring a CTO in March, when spokeswoman Kirsten Kukowski told the New York Times the ideal candidate might well be an "outsider" from the political world — a description Barkett certainly fits.

Barkett's hire comes months after many commentators suggested Barack Obama's data and digital teams gave his campaign an edge over that of Republican opponent Mitt Romney.

Are Republicans behind Democrats when it comes to digital and technology in campaigns? What can they do to catch up? Share your thoughts in the comments.

Facebook confirmed last week's reports that it has signed a 10-year lease for just under 100,000 square feet of office space at 770 Broadway in lower Manhattan. The company will be moving all of its teams from its current office near Grand Central to two floors at the new office, the interior of which architect Frank Gehry has agreed to design.

Gehry is already leading the expansion of Facebook's headquarters in Menlo Park, Calif. A source familiar with Facebook's plans said the company is "extraordinarily pleased with [Gehry's] ability to delivery an incredible quality of design at a remarkably efficient price" and asked him to do the interior of the New York office as well. The source added that the design for the New York office will be "very similar" to the one Gehry has signed for Facebook's headquarters, featuring open floor plans, natural lighting and spaces for collaboration.

Facebook opened a New York office in 2008 to accommodate its sales and marketing teams, later adding engineering, design and communications staffers. Its current space is a little more than half the size of the office Facebook plans to move into. Other tenants of the 15-story building include AOL/The Huffington Post, J.Crew and Adweek.

Social media could "provoke great masses”, said Binali Yıldırım, Turkey's Transportation, Maritime and Communication Minister, when he announced that the country is planning to block access to Facebook and Twitter in order to prevent a “threat to public safety.”

In May, the Turkish government announced the new measure would take place in August and thousands of Turks concentrated in some 40 cities and towns around the country. Turkey’s Internet regulator wanted to introduce a selection of filters that users would choose from before browsing the Internet. Also, some words could be banned, such as “blond” and “sister-in-law”.

According to the journalist Olcay Aydilek of the Turkish newspaper Habertürk, Yıldırım affirmed that social media is a “threat” and “measures must be taken.”  The block would be momentary or last only a few hours, a report said.

Ministry's reports allegedly showed that the social networks acted as a "catalyst" that generated ethnic and religious confrontations at times of crisis, especially after attacks by the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK). For instance, in July two Turkish soldiers were killed and ten others were wounded in a clash with terrorists in south-eastern province of Hakkari.

Besides, Yıldırım appeared in the television saying that these kind of social sites were “very effective” after a deadly bomb attack in Gaziantep, near the police station, on 20 August, the second day of the Ramadan. People published on social sites  "false reports of a second bombing, and claims that the Peace and Democracy Party offices in the city were torched. These are very troubling," he said.

Likewise, the minister stated that these platforms facilitated the revolutions in Tunisia, Libya and Egypt, calling them “revolutions of communication.” He said that social media may have caused “good things to happen there but it could also be used to provoke great masses and misguide them.”

In an attempt to not be called as “censorship”, Yıldırım contacted Turkey's Information Technology and Communication Board (BTK) to create a balanced way to interfere with Turkish Internet users' access to Facebook and Twitter.

Turkey has 31 million Facebook users and 9 million Twitter users; 18,4 million of them use internet 34 hours per month.

The French organisation Reporters Without Borders released in March its list of the 12 “Enemies of the Internet”. China, Cuba, North Korea and Syria are at the top of the list, but other countries are under surveillance, such as Turkey, Egypt and Tunisia. However, with this new measure, Turkey may climb up soon a big number of positions.

Desperate to make its homescreen replacement Home seem less invasive, Facebook is advertising that you can temporarily deactivate it and use your HTC First or other Android phone as normal. The fact that Home replaces your widgets and app folders has been a core complaint. Facebook vows to fix that, but until then it’s reminding people they can leave Home for stock Android or their old launcher.

The post by the Facebook Mobile Page which was also being shown as an ad in some peoples mobile feeds, says “Cover feed on the HTC First keeps your friends close by. But if you need some alone time, simply turn off Home and use your phone as usual. http://bit.ly/htcfirsthome“.  When turned off, the HTC First reverts to stock Android 4.1, and the downloadable version of Home gives way to whatever launcher users had installed before.

Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg addressed the issue of users’ disappointment with how Home takes over their phone this week at D11 when asked if the product was a success:

“Facebook Home is v1 of what we think is a very large transformation that we think will absolutely happen, which is rebuilding your phone around people.

The way [phones are] organized is still around activities and apps. We think that phones will be reorganized around people, and we think Facebook Home is the first version of that. We consider it v1, very early. We’d love if we could put out a v1 version and get everything right. The feedback we’re getting is very bi-modal. If you look at our stars, we get fives and we get ones. We get almost no threes.

The people who love it, they’re heavy Facebook users. They want that experience. Not only do they love it but the metrics are working very well for us. They’re using Facebook 25% more and they’re doing 10% more more messaging. So this is a win, both in terms of how this will drive our business and for them.

For the people who don’t love it, they don’t like how it takes over their phone. They don’t like how the launcher re-organizes the apps they’ve already launched, but for the most part they actually like the two core features we launched which are Cover Feed and Chat Heads. So what we are doing is getting that feedback. I don’t know how long it will take. I think it will be a long road. but we really believe we’re on a path to making phones more social.”

As Sheryl explained, a big issue with Home was the sacrifice you have to make to use it. Android users gain some features, but have to give up much of the personalization they’ve worked to build into their phone in the form of widgets, folders, and app organization. I believe their omission from Home is related to some of the team that built Home being iPhone users who don’t have these options normally, so they didn’t miss them.

Supporting these customization features could make Home more of a bonus than a trade. When Home launched, Facebook Product Director Adam Moserri told me there were a lot of features he wished had made it into the initial build, including app folders.

Now Facebook is trying to get some of that functionality added through its monthly updates to Home. On May 9th at a small press conference at Facebook headquarters, Moserri unveiled Dock, a tray of a user’s favorite apps that’s persistently visible at the bottom of homescreen app launcher. Facebook plans to let users import their Dock of most frequently used apps from their previous Android launcher into Home.

Many are calling Home a flop already, and maybe it will be, but it’s early to make that judgement now. Facebook has a very long-term view for the software. Mark Zuckerberg’s belief is that we’re destined to share more and more with our friends, so some will want to prioritize them ahead of utility applications in their phones.

Zuckerberg told Wired’s Stephan Levy, “Three years from now, people are going to be sharing eight to ten times as much stuff. We’d better be there, because if we’re not, some other service will be.” That’s the goal of Home. But for Facebook to get to that future, it needs Home to gain traction. It’s hasn’t yet, having only hit one million downloads on May 10th. The active user count is suspected to be much smaller. As Sandberg said, it will be a long road to success…if Facebook’s even going in the right direction.