Facebook asks users who or what they sleep with

The company claims it wanted people to reveal what, rather than who, they share their beds with, such as a teddy bear

(REUTERS/Dado Ruvic)

Facebook has been trying to get users to reveal who or what they “usually” sleep with.

Users of its new Did You Know feature have been asked to complete the statement: “I usually sleep with…” The site introduced Did You Know last month, as a way of prompting people to share more about their personal lives. But some of the questions appear to be a little too personal.

People who have come across the prompt on the social network have complained about it being “creepy”.

The company has now removed the question from Did You Know.

Facebook claims the statement was simply poorly worded, and that its intention wasn’t to get people to reveal who they sleep with, but what they sleep with, such as a teddy bear.

“We learned one of the questions in the ‘Did You Know’ feature was causing confusion among some people who saw it,” a Facebook spokesperson told The Independent.

“We imagined someone might tell their friends about sleeping with their favourite stuffed giraffe, but we’ve removed the question after our community provided feedback that it was too personal.”

Did You Know, which launched in December, is designed to get Facebook users to post more status updates.

You can use it by opening the “What’s on your mind” box and scrolling down to Answer A Question. You can skip questions you don’t want to answer, but if you come across one that you do want to answer, you can post it as a status update.

Questions and statements served up by Did You Know include:

• Would you rather get up early or late?
• The night before an exam, I…
• I was over-excited when…
• Someone once tried to flirt with me in…
• Biker boots or cowboy boots?
• My favourite position to sleep in is…

Facebook recently announced that it is making major changes to the News Feed.

It will tweak what people can see, and show more posts from the people users actually know, and fewer from news organisations and celebrities they follow.

The changes are largely designed to encourage people to interact with more content on the site and share more information about themselves.