Mother’s Day weekend has officially arrived and to celebrate, Facebook is offering a digital flower for users to send their mothers in lieu of fresh flowers. The virtual flower, which is located in the string of reaction buttons, would only be deliverable if both the sender and their mother are on the social media platform.
The virtual flower was first spotted by Twitter user Sreedev Sharma. His tweet read: “Facebook testing 'Thankful' (flower emoji) reaction? 'Yay' and 'Confused' are no more. Source: Facebook page source).”
Facebook testing 'Thankful' (flower emoji) reaction? 'Yay' and 'Confused' are no more. Source: Facebook page source) pic.twitter.com/32MmoJWHtF
— Sreedev Sharma (@sreedevsharma) May 5, 2016
The virtual flower will only be available in certain markets and The Verge reports that the United States will not be one of them.
"To celebrate Mother's Day, we are testing the ability for people in a few markets to leave a flower reaction," said Facebook in a statement.
Earlier this year, Facebook changed the way people can react to a post by expanding options. Instead of just a “like” button, users have a range of responses that include "love," "haha," "wow," "sad," and "angry.” The flower reaction button is the first time Facebook has experimented with a temporary reaction to correspond with a holiday or special occasion.
Prior to the launch of Facebook reactions, the company tested the responses in Spain and Ireland. Keeping that in mind, it would not seem far-fetched for Facebook to be testing the temporary reaction button in limited markets prior to rolling it out on a more regular basis worldwide.
