NYT Sources Say Facebook Phone Coming Next Year

We've been hearing rumors of a Facebook phone for quite a while now. Prior to the frenzy that was the Facebook IPO, the prospect of the social network building its own phone was probably one of the more common Facebook rumors. Facebook celebrated its IPO on May 18 and, what do you know, we're once again hearing talk of a Facebook phone. The latest round of whispers was kicked off by the New York Times, which this past Sunday reported on Facebook's plans to build a phone. NYT cites Facebook staff, engineers, and people briefed on Facebook's plans as saying the company hopes to release its own phone by next year. NYT's sources say Facebook has already hired about six former Apple employees. These are people who had previously worked on the iPhone, iPad or iOS teams at Cupertino. The hires are said to have come from both the hardware and software divisions at Apple. Back in April, there were reports that Facebook and HTC were teaming up to develop a customized smartphone. According to NYT's sources, this current Facebook phone project also involves HTC and though Facebook hasn't confirmed or denied plans for a phone, it's thought Mark Zuckerberg is worried about missing the boat on mobile. "Mark is worried that if he doesn’t create a mobile phone in the near future that Facebook will simply become an app on other mobile platforms," a Facebook employee is quoted as telling NYT. One thing the Times' report doesn't mention is if Facebook is looking to use its own custom operating system or if the company plans to go with one that's already available from a third party, such as Microsoft or Google. Last we heard, Microsoft was eager to pitch Windows Phone to Facebook and was pushing three advantages of such a partnership: Microsoft isn't Google, the company knows what to do and how to do it, and, finally, Redmond long ago established relationships with important people across the industry. sex toys,sex gadgets