There is an estimated 1,500 posts from a user's friends list that is lined up to appear on the News Feed. But an algorithm created by Facebook's engineers determines what stories or news will appear on one's news feed after taking into consideration the posts that one has liked, shared and commented on.

However, software engineers Ansha Yu and Sami Tas know "these factors don't always tell us the whole story of what is most meaningful" to the user. So a newly created algorithm that the company is now using also factors in how long a user has looked at a post.

It is interesting, albeit a bit creepy, to know that Facebook is really checking what a user looks at or reads in order to have a better idea of what that person is interested in, even though he or she did not "like" the post.

It makes sense to take that factor into consideration as every person with a Facebook account has experienced reading about something that caught their interest, for instance, the news that the escaped tiger in Georgia mauled a man. Of course, some users would feel weird if they "like" that story.

The new algorithm will factor in how much time a Facebook user has stayed on a post and checks it against data about that person's usual reading pattern. This will help Facebook's system in determining what kind of posts or content the user finds relevant. Going back to the previous example, the new algorithm can interpret that as an interest in the news.

So a user that just made a cursory scroll through a relative's selfie but took a minute to read about Stephen King's new book would have a News Feed that will feature more posts about King or writers like him and fewer posts (and selfies) of the relative.

It goes without saying that the new algorithm is not perfect. Some groups are actually concerned about how this will affect people and the exchange of information since Facebook will basically be controlling that in the News Feed.

This is of particular concern with millennials and the younger generation who are getting their news from Facebook. Based on the parameters of the algorithm, it is possible that some important news events would not be given much attention and this will eventually harm society.

One example a sociologist gave was the time when the Michael Brown and Ferguson riots and the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge were two of the most popular news on media. The Ice Bucket Challenge appeared more often in more Facebook News Feeds than news about the ongoing riots in Ferguson at the time.