Did you know that any message sent to you on Facebook which isn’t from a friend or a friend of a friend gets filtered into an “other” subfolder?

Most people don’t, and this means you probably have dozens of messages sitting on your Facebook page that you’ve never looked at before.

While it’s true the overwhelming majority of these notes are invitations to parties you don’t want to attend from folks you don’t know or other things you’ve opted out of, occasionally something important will find its way into this more or less hidden folder.

For example, over on Slate, writer Elizaberth Weingarten tells a sad tale of losing her laptop and then not getting the Facebook message from the guy who found it because the considerate note was filtered into her “other” folder.

So make sure to check this “other” folder from time-to-time — and certainly when you’ve just lost something important. If you happen to find a message you needed to read when you do, you can thank us by liking TheFW on Facebook.

[via Slate]

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