Facebook Home Announced

“What if our phones were designed around people and not apps?” asked Mark Zuckerberg, and I guess he has the answer to that rhetorical question of his. In fact, Facebook has decided that the smartphone’s home screen should be more about content rather than a list of apps, but this paradigm shift will certainly take some getting used to, and I will be the first to admit that. Of course, there is also every possibility that this idea might catch up on desktop operating systems down the road, but that remains to be seen.

Facebook Home is the social network’s initiative to turn things upside down, where your friends’ updates will be seen in real-time on your device’s home screen. To “Like” a photo, all it takes is a double tap, and you’re good to go. Apart from that, swiping notifications might be something you as a social butterfly could get used to eventually, with Chat Heads being the “main course”, so to speak, of Facebook Home.

Just how does Chat Heads work? Well, the icons that carry your friend’s picture can be moved all over the place, allowing you to gain access to all of the communications with said person, where you can multi-task with other apps simultaneously. Whenever you are no longer communicating with that person, you can just drag his/her icon to the bottom of the screen.

It looks like custom phones might be the order of the future with the introduction of Facebook Home, and this proves that the Sailfish Mobile OS has a decent chance at surviving the new era of smartphone operating systems. Facebook Home will be released this coming April 12th, which frankly is not too far away, and we are stoked to experience it for ourselves. Other than that, we also know that Facebook Home will arrive on tablets in the months ahead.

Of course, the HTC First is not the only device that allows you to enjoy Facebook Home, as there are also other smartphones in this equation, and they are none other than the HTC One, HTC One X, HTC One X+, Samsung Galaxy S3, Samsung Galaxy S4 and the Samsung Galaxy Note 2 as you can see below.

Edwin Kee
Categories: Cellphones
Tags: Facebook, Facebook Home