Don't want to see spoilers on Facebook? Now, snooze keywords
Facebook is testing a feature which will allow users to "snooze" keywords for 30 days. This means that if you don't want to see spoilers of a show or a match, or want to avoid repeatedly coming across a politically hot debate on the social network, you can snooze specific keywords and they will no longer appear in your News Feed, Groups, or Pages.
Here's how you can snooze keywords on Facebook
Go to a post that includes the keyword(s) you want to snooze. Hit the drop-down arrow and select "snooze keywords in this post." You will be presented with a list of nouns from the post. Select all the words that you want to snooze and any post including them will henceforth be hidden from your Facebook for a month.
Running into spoilers you don't want to see
Finding a post that includes the keywords you are looking to avoid defeats the whole purpose of the feature. To that, Facebook said it is considering adding a separate, preemptive snooze option in News Feed Preferences in the next few weeks.
What else the snooze option can and can't do
The feature only works on text and not on images. It also won't suggest synonyms of the keywords you're snoozing, so you'll have to separately find posts with all potential keywords you're looking to avoid. Snoozing a keyword won't block ads that include them. This is probably because Facebook doesn't want users to mass-block the company's revenue-generator.
Why only temporary snooze button, why not permanent mute option?
Facebook said, "If we hear from people that they want more or less time," the company might update the feature accordingly before its official launch. A permanent keyword mute option, like the ones Twitter and Instagram already provide, can help users better tackle abuse on the platform. Facebook is also considering adding the option of a recurring snooze list.
Earlier Facebook tested snoozing of people, Pages, and Groups
Last December, Facebook rolled out a 30-day snooze option for people, Pages, and Groups. The feature provided users with an option to mute content they didn't want to see without having to leave a community or unfollow/unfriend someone.
