Since its inception, Facebook has strived to use technology to improve the human experience. What began as a way for single college students to mingle has become a global network with almost 1 billion users. To build a product this successful, it’s necessary to have a deep understanding of what it is to be human, building tools that both work with existing group behavior and meet universal human needs. Facebook has taken an empathic approach to community design and has created new ways for people to connect, share about themselves, and even document their life stories. With so many user-centered features, the new Facebook has the potential to become an indispensable part of your social life.

Like always, Facebook offers tools for both taking in information from your friends, as well as sharing information back to them. But now this can be done in three different ways, each differentiated by the scale and scope of the interaction. One way to describe the three behaviors is to glance, read, or savor.

Nearly all of us are initially resistant to new things and the unfamiliar. For this reason you might find yourself missing the old Facebook or feeling a little clumsy moving around the new interface. But beneath the buttons and icons and settings is a core platform that has been designed to work for you. It’s supposed to help you find out about all the new trends in your friend’s lives; it’s supposed to make it easier to stay in touch with the many groups of people you know; it’s supposed to help you remember all the great moments you’ve had in the past; and it’s supposed to help you see your friend’s in a new light through a glimpse of their entire life story. It’s possible that Facebook will fail to delivery all of these promises, but it’s incredibly refreshing to think that they’ve even tried.