For some reason I've had the 'new style' facebook feeds and chat for a few weeks already.<p>Usually when facebook releases updates and everyone has a little rant about it I just sit back and roll my eyes. These things usually have a long term advantage, and change is always a bit painful for users.<p>However I've had a list of about 25 friends in alphabetical order, from A through to D, just stuck at the right side of my screen for about 6 weeks now. I have no idea why they are there. They're not online. They're not people I historically interact a lot with, I can't sort the list, or add favourites. I can't hide it, because that also hides the people online I might want to chat to.<p>I honestly would love to know the reasoning behind this. Someone, somewhere sat through multiple planning sessions and laid out some kind of argument that this delivers value <i>somewhere</i>, either in some obscure way to facebook themselves or somehow to the end user. The design doesn't bother me, but the functionality does seem... arbitrary? What inherent interest could I possibly have in my first few alphabetically sorted friends?