Facebook Phone Rumors

All eyes have been on Facebook lately, and not just because The Social Network will hit theaters soon. Early on Sunday, gizmo blog TechCrunch reported that Facebook was building the software and operating system for a mobile phone, with two senior execs with significant experience in the area, Joe Hewitt and Matthew Papakipos, spearheading the initiative. The software would purportedly be built by a third party. Later on Sunday, though, Facebook spokesperson Jaime Schopflin told CNET, "Facebook is not building a phone...Our view is that almost all experiences would be better if they were social, so integrating deeply into existing platforms and operating systems is a good way to enable this." He added, "The bottom line is that whenever we work on a deep integration, people want to call it a 'Facebook Phone' because that's such an attractive soundbite, but building phones is just not what we do."