Facebook to turn the volume on social music at F8 developer conference: report

(AFP PHOTO LOIC VENANCE)

After trialing local daily deals, movie streaming and a string of Google+ like privacy enhancements, Facebook will partner with Spotify, MOG and Rdio to try its hand at a socially-enhanced music platform.

The news comes via a report posted on technology blog Mashable which claims Facebook will unveil the service during its F8 developer conference in September.

“It will allow users to listen to music from within Facebook.com,” said Mashable.

“According to two sources familiar with the matter, Facebook will not directly host or stream any music or media,” noted Mashable. “Instead, it will rely on partners to provide the content. This is in contrast to Apple, Google and Amazon’s strategy of hosting music content on their servers. Facebook’s plan is to become a platform for media content in the same way it is a platform for applications and games.”

Facebook music rumors started surfacing earlier in the year when software engineer Jeff Rose started taking a closer look at the code found on Facebook’s newly released desktop video chat service. Within the code Rose found details of an unannounced feature called “Facebook Vibes.”

“The vibes app connects with a music download dialog in the page though, so I’m guessing that with this release we are seeing the seeds for Facebook’s upcoming music offering,” wrote Rose.

Facebook neither confirmed or denied Mashable’s report. “There’s nothing new to announce,” a Facebook spokesperson told the blog. “Many of the most popular music services around the world are integrated with Facebook and we’re constantly talking to our partners about ways to improve these integrations.”

A recent report in The New York Times indicated that Facebook is planning to add photo filters to its mobile application in the coming months too, in a bid to challenge popular photo-sharing application Instagram.

Facebook users can look forward to more Facebook announcements and updates during the Facebook F8 conference on September 22.

For those who can’t attend F8 in person, the event will be streamed live at f8.facebook.com.

http://www.facebook.com/f8