The Facebook update that wasn’t.  What can we learn?

So those wild and wacky Zuckerbergers were at it again yesterday.

For a few fleeting moments it looked like the Facebooks folks had flipped the switch on the rumored Fan page redesign.  Then, crash….bang….zoom, the entire system goes down and when it comes back the fan pages are back to the Tab-laden walls we've come to know and love?

Mashable chronicles this view into the possible future including the backstroke from Facebook saying it was all just a prototype.

But this quick glimpse might give those of us in the Facebook business some direction, especially as it related to the future of tabs and landing pages.

• In this redesign, tabs now are listed under the main brand logo with an icon and a name attached to them.  We may want to become more intentional about what we title each tab and which brand icon we attach to it.
• Also, the latest trend has been to elongate the main brand icon to stretch down the page.  If these branded tabs are now listed below it, we might want to rethink that strategy since we want to make sure the reader can see the tab easily.

Additional foreshadowed changes related to "questions" and "comments" allowing brands to more easily ask questions and get fan feedback.  Also, admins might be able to log in as themselves in the future and switch easily between pages that oversee.

There is a lot more where that came from.  And with Facebook there always is.  We should learn from this peak into the future and get ourselves ready for it.