--- title: Facebook Ask Button Provides New Way To Nag Friends description: Finally—a subtle way to substantiate those divorce rumors! canonical: https://time.com/104720/facebooks-new-ask-button-gives-you-a-whole-new-way-to-badger-friends-about-their-relationship-status/ author: Laura Stampler article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2014-05-19T15:31:52.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-05-11T04:48:39.894Z og:title: Facebook's New 'Ask' Button Gives You a Whole New Way to Badger Friends About Their Relationship Status og:description: Finally—a subtle way to substantiate those divorce rumors! og:url: https://time.com/104720/facebooks-new-ask-button-gives-you-a-whole-new-way-to-badger-friends-about-their-relationship-status/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt6d5f0d65bcdbab2b/6986827a1eebf71f9336f801/bc9209-002.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: Online Dating og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Facebook's New 'Ask' Button Gives You a Whole New Way to Badger Friends About Their Relationship Status twitter:description: Finally—a subtle way to substantiate those divorce rumors! twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt6d5f0d65bcdbab2b/6986827a1eebf71f9336f801/bc9209-002.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Facebook's New 'Ask' Button Gives You a Whole New Way to Badger Friends About Their Relationship Status by [Laura Stampler](https://time.com/author/laura-stampler/) ## Laura Stampler May 19, 2014 3:31 PM UTC  Male, female and love-heart symbols on computer keys (Composite) Male, female and love-heart symbols on computer keys (Composite)Getty Images by [Laura Stampler](https://time.com/author/laura-stampler/) ## Laura Stampler May 19, 2014 3:31 PM UTC Particularly observant Facebook stalkers might have noticed a brand new feature this weekend that gives them a whole new way to badger their friends, lovers, and ish acquaintances. Say hello to the “Ask” button, an inquisitive new tool that pops up next to your friends’ undisclosed relationship statuses, work affiliations, hometowns—anything they left blank in their “About” section. (Finally, a subtle way to substantiate those divorce rumors!) As coupledom is only real if it’s Facebook offish, I decided to see what happens when I sent an “Ask” inquiry regarding my boyfriend’s empty relationship status to test out the new feature:  Ask requests can’t be done anonymously. Ever-inquisitive Facebook requires you leave a note justifying your prying nature.  This is the message he received — the status can exist for our eyes only, which kind of seems to miss the point of relationship statuses, but whatever:  Facebook (My request was denied because, well, we aren’t in middle school and thus aren’t required by middle school law to report our relationship to social media.) [A Facebook spokesperson told the _Daily Dot_](http://www.dailydot.com/technology/facebook-ask-button/) that there’s no way to prevent the “Ask” button from showing up, which is incredibly annoying for obvious reasons. People share what they’re comfortable sharing. All the button does is enable nagging from people who aren’t close enough with you to know where you went to college, if you’re single, or whether you were spared in the last round of company layoffs. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/104720/facebooks-new-ask-button-gives-you-a-whole-new-way-to-badger-friends-about-their-relationship-status/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/104720/facebooks-new-ask-button-gives-you-a-whole-new-way-to-badger-friends-about-their-relationship-status/"},"headline":"Facebook's New 'Ask' Button Gives You a Whole New Way to Badger Friends About Their Relationship Status","datePublished":"2014-05-19T15:31:52.000Z","dateModified":"2026-05-11T04:48:39.894Z","description":"Finally—a subtle way to substantiate those divorce rumors!","url":"https://time.com/104720/facebooks-new-ask-button-gives-you-a-whole-new-way-to-badger-friends-about-their-relationship-status/","keywords":["Newsfeed","Tech","Living","Internet","Technology","facebook","relationships"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt6d5f0d65bcdbab2b/6986827a1eebf71f9336f801/bc9209-002.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Laura Stampler","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/laura-stampler/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt6d5f0d65bcdbab2b/6986827a1eebf71f9336f801/bc9209-002.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Online Dating","caption":"Online Dating","creditText":"Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/104720/facebooks-new-ask-button-gives-you-a-whole-new-way-to-badger-friends-about-their-relationship-status/","name":"Facebook's New 'Ask' Button Gives You a Whole New Way to Badger Friends About Their Relationship Status"}}]}] ```