Facebook has launched an interesting feature today: the ability to tag friends in status updates and other messages from the publisher. As with Twitter, you use the “@” symbol followed by your friend’s name (or the name of a Facebook Page or Group) to tag something, but the message shows up without the symbol and just a link to the person’s profile.

The ability to “Tag” friends was one that Facebook popularized with its tagging feature in photos years ago. As Facebook notes in its blog post announcing the new “@” feature, tagging is one of the most popular features on the social network. I’d venture to say it’s probably one of the early features that made Facebook’s social technology so distinct.

But Twitter, or at least its users, pioneered the “@” functionality to tag friends, which has long been missing from Facebook’s status updates. That said, there are some key differences both from a UI perspective and in the way tagging on Facebook works. Unlike Twitter, where you have to memorize your friends’ usernames (or use a third party client that features auto-complete), on Facebook when you begin typing in a friend’s name following the “@” symbol, you’ll see a drop-down menu that will let you choose from your list of friends, groups, events and applications.

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I am just wondering if this will make a difference in your life? Will it change the way you use Facebook?

How will you use this feature?

I can think of several ways.

1) It might eliminate some time expenditure when I get behind. I wade through all the old messages rather compulsively not wanting to miss a conversation where I am expected to respond.

2) It can make things a bit more interesting if one is being discussed.

3) It can enable people who might be interested in a topic to be invited in to share their views.