Facebook Lite Launches Worldwide, Targets Twitter

Facebook has started rolling out a new, simplified version of its website worldwide and appears to be aimed at its audience with slower connections, which incidentally are not all in developing countries.

Presented as the fastest way to keep in touch, the slimmed down version of the site should allow million more users worldwide to access the site's main features without having to wait for ages for extras to appear.

The interface of the Facebook lite (access it here) loads faster than the "fat" version and adopts a microblogging structure, the same as Twitter, with the message stream displayed on the left and ads and the list of people you may know on the right.

There's no trace of events, application, options to write on walls, posting photos or videos. This is a barebone Facebook, which like Marmite, will attract passionate debates from lovers and haters.

A spokesperson for the social networking website confirmed that "Similar to the Facebook experience you get on your mobile phones, Facebook 'Lite' is a fast-loading, simplified version of Facebook that enables people to make comments, accept Friend requests, write on people's Walls, and look at photos and status updates."

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He further added that "we are currently testing Facebook Lite in countries where we are seeing lots of new users coming to Facebook for the first time and are looking to start off with a more simple experience."