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FACEBOOK HAS UNVEILED a new mobile software suite which makes the social network the “home” of Android smartphones.
Chief executive Mark Zuckerberg said the new software would make Facebook the home screen of Android phones, and allow the devices to be “designed around people and not apps.”
“We’re not building a phone and we’re not building an operating system, but we are building something that’s a lot deeper than an app,” Zuckerberg told a gathering at the company’s headquarters in Silicon Valley.
Facebook called the new software “a new way to turn your Android phone into a great, living, social phone.”
Home is a completely new experience that lets you see the world through people, not apps.
The software, which allows users to see Facebook first when they turn on their phones, will be available for download starting April 12, Zuckerberg said. Another version for tablets is in the works.
Home is also being made available through Taiwan-based electronics firm HTC, which will launch its Facebook home-screen smartphone called HTC First, to be available through US carrier AT&T.
Zuckerberg demonstrated how a user would start with Facebook on the home screen and be able to navigate and switch back and forth between apps, and simultaneously send and receive messages through “chat heads” which are overlaid on the screen.
“I think this is a really big deal for Facebook,” said Peter Corbett of the research firm iStrategyLabs.
We’ve actually seen Facebook call themselves a mobile company recently and if you look at their analytics, more than half of their users are accessing Facebook through mobile. Now that they have what will essentially be a native branch of the Android operating system that they control and build upon, this is the future of Facebook.
Corbett added that “Apple should be worried to a certain extent” because Facebook will “put this in front of millions and millions of the world’s youth who may decide ‘I want a Facebook phone instead of an iPhone.’”
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Yeah, just what I need, Facebook embedded deep into my phone and my life! Git tae fook!
its facebooks next step in surveillance.what are people getting up to on their own phones that they paid for?they need to know what your doing when your not logged in or even if you dont use their service which i dont? they allready spy on what you do when your signed out.facebook = big brother.
Couldn’t agree more. It’s going to establish a hook into your “local device” activities and submit data back over REST calls, like a blood swollen tick. No thanks! But it will be marketed in such a way that it will make your online life easier through intelligent recommendations no doubt. Call it Intrusion or seamless services, you decide.
i just wanna call and text, nothing more, nothing less
If you are not paying for the product you are the product. If you don’t like that then don’t use it. They have to monetize it somehow and they found a way thats free for users.
Next will be mind control through your phone.
Ill pass.
I’ll* (Thought I would fix it before the grammar police get on my case!)
I’ll pass with you I think most will. Facebook is great as app but its not taking over my android no way.
Notice thay android is so open you can if you so choice have a program run almost as another operating system. Where as with ios you can’t.
Apples dead in the water
Stay away from my phone zoidburg.
Hear hear!!! Hope this is optional!
There is always the option of deactivating if you don’t like it
Check my last tweet to see a screengrab of what permissions are currently required for the android phone app.
Look, I’m only with Facebook so I can see thejournal on the side.
I’m sorry to break it to you this way, I know we shared once.
..Like!?..
: )
FB recommended a nice pizza restaurant in Sligo for me today (I live in Dublin). Can’t wait for discounted ticket to North Korea :)
Is that the new Samsung Galaxy in your profile picture?
It’s like a bloody coffee table!
Haha nah its Chinese (as are the known brands). Its my best Android ever and a great price. It will protect me against a North Korean invasion so I shall have the last laff. Ha
Would anyone actually be that obsessed with Facebook that they’d embed it right in their devices?
Nope!
No thanks….the android app is pure shite as it is and also facebook has become the equivalent of looking into the fridge when your not hungry.Ill pass!
So, they can access even more data about you by collecting your contacts and emails from your phone? Oh and to send you “targeted” ads.
Do fb think we are really stupid?
Oh and the existing app is such poor quality, expect to have to reboot your phone twenty times a day
idont care
Yet you read the story… and commented.
Bit of an Oxymoron there, Lisa.
Bit of a moron there dublin lad
It’s not nice to call people names. I’m sure Lisa isn’t a moron.
… Best comeback ever….
It’s an android os with a Facebook front end, personally I don’t care about 90% of the crap people post on Facebook and don’t see why I would need to see every cute picture of a cat that some one on my feed adds every time I turn on my phone. This is nothin more than location based data farming and adds nothing new for the end user.
Facebook can go and suck my d**k
Can anyone think if any reason whatsoever why anybody in their right mind would want something like this near them?
Big brother and sister ,aunty and uncle. Turn off delete your account
Lots of negative comments – maybe it’ll be an improvement.
The kids will love it.
I can’t believe they’re doing this to the Android App. I’m going to moan on my facebook timeline and on social media sites like this for about 24hrs before then going back to using their free service as normal.
Social network 2??
Anyone who wants this app think about Facebooks motivation for one second. They want to monitor all users better for pushing content to them. Stay away at all costs and just pick up the phone to ring your mate or use what’s app/ viber
errr… no thanks. yer fine.
Sounds crap.
AOSP Android all the way! Sheer pure Android experience without the bloat (including carrier bloatware btw) :-D \o/
Obviously yes
Sounds like this will be some sort of launcher, hopefully it can be turned off or at least replaced by a stock one.
This is what kids want and will double the share price. Clever move from a business perspective.
It turns out that the software is not available to download in Ireland.
The facebook and fb messenger apps were updated and to tget the download you have to go into the fb app settings and enable home. It then takes you to a page on Google Play to download the app but displays a banner across the top of the screen saying that it is not available in your country.
So it’s a software that makes your Android a Facebook phone?
have your say