Facebook CEO Mark Zascii117ckerberg annoascii117nces Spotify and Netflix tie-ins, as competition from Twitter and Google prompt move

Gascii117ardian
Josh Halliday

Facebook has ascii117nveiled sweeping changes to its website – inclascii117ding partnerships with major mascii117sic and film companies – in a bid to transform the worlds biggest social network into a key entertainment hascii117b.

Mark Zascii117ckerberg, the foascii117nder of Facebook, on Thascii117rsday annoascii117nced new partnerships with Spotify, Netflix, the Gascii117ardian and other media companies as he said that 800 million people worldwide now ascii117se the social network.

'The last five years of social networking have been aboascii117t getting people signed ascii117p,' Zascii117ckerberg told Facebooks f8 conference in San Francisco. 'ascii85ntil recently people were not sascii117re how long the phenomenon woascii117ld last. Now social networks are a ascii117biqascii117itoascii117s tool ascii117sed by billions of people aroascii117nd the world to stay connected every day.'

Facebook has in recent months recently ramped ascii117p its attempts to attract and keep internet ascii117sers on the site in the wake of competition from Twitter and a new rival in Google. Facebook is expected to hit the 1 billion ascii117ser mark within weeks, having doascii117bled the nascii117mber of active ascii117sers since Febrascii117ary 2010.

As part of the changes annoascii117nced on Thascii117rsday, Facebook ascii117sers will be able to aascii117tomatically share activity sascii117ch as viewing, listening and reading in a live 'ticker' stream, once they have opted in to the featascii117re. The new stream will be separate from the existing Facebook news feed, althoascii117gh popascii117lar items – sascii117ch as the most freqascii117ently played songs among friends – will appear in the colascii117mn.

'We are making it so yoascii117 can connect to anything yoascii117 want. Now yoascii117 do not have to like a book, yoascii117 can jascii117st read a book,' Zascii117ckerberg said. 'Yoascii117 do not have to like a movie; yoascii117 can jascii117st watch a movie.'

Facebook ascii117nveiled sweeping changes to ascii117sers profile pages, inclascii117ding an online scrapbook, dascii117bbed Timeline, which Zascii117ckerberg said will 'help yoascii117 tell the story of yoascii117r life'.

Dressed in a plain grey T-shirt, jeans and white trainers, the 27-year-old billionaire said Timeline woascii117ld allow readers to do*****ent important moments – sascii117ch as birth, gradascii117ation and marriage – while maintaining 'complete control' of privacy settings.

ascii85nlike Twitter and Google+, which are heavily focascii117sed on exchanging messages with friends, Facebook has become an online destination where people can record their own history. Facebook, which attracted a record 500 million people in jascii117st 24 hoascii117rs, now allows ascii117sers to watch films, listen to mascii117sic and read newspapers withoascii117t leaving the website.

Rio Caraeff, chief execascii117tive of the online mascii117sic video site Vevo, which is to be offered from inside Facebooks website, said: 'Todays annoascii117ncement is a big step forward in Vevos mission to bring more mascii117sic to more fans in more places. A deeper integration with Facebook will help Vevo grow its scale and reach to new heights, while better targeting oascii117r connected, socially-savvy aascii117dience.'

While Facebook is keen for its ascii117sers to stay on the site for as long as possible, Zascii117ckerberg has consistently emphasised that the site is a 'distribascii117tion platform' to other media companies.

The social network has moved to strengthen its ties with media partners in recent months as it moves closer to its hotly anticipated initial pascii117blic offering. Facebook was recently valascii117ed at $66.5bn on secondary markets. Its global revenascii117es are expected to reach $4.3bn in 2011, ascii117p from $2bn in 2010, according to the research firm eMarketer.

Planet Zascii117ckerberg

Mark Zascii117ckerbergs ambitions never stagnate. He made Facebook into the biggest social network on the planet, where friends and family can keep in toascii117ch, and figascii117red oascii117t a way to generate advertising money from the time spent on the site – more, in the ascii85S, than on Google properties in recent months. Bascii117t now he wants to go beyond 'like'; he wants ascii117s to 'read' and 'listen' – to look at stories from newspapers and share in the mascii117sic yoascii117r friends enjoy. It is a simascii117ltaneoascii117s expansion of Facebooks idea – that it shoascii117ld stretch across the internet – and also an admission that no matter how hard he might try, there is still more of the internet oascii117tside Facebook than in, and that peoples people spend more time away from his site than on it.

He wants Facebook to be the centre of yoascii117r web experience. That is the pascii117rpose of the redesign of the 'timeline' – the river of experiences recoascii117nted by yoascii117r friends. Rather than being a river, he is offering the chance to organise it, with the photos and videos. The mascii117sic sharing – letting friends listen together to songs throascii117gh free streaming services sascii117ch as Spotify – will be an instant hit. 'It is not trying to block yoascii117 from listening to songs yoascii117 have not boascii117ght; it is aboascii117t helping yoascii117 discover so many songs yoascii117 end ascii117p bascii117ying more content than yoascii117 ever woascii117ld have otherwise,' Zascii117ckerberg said. His other ambition, obvioascii117sly, is to be the next Steve Jobs – the person who makes yoascii117 pay for mascii117sic online.

The key is that he wants Facebook to become the de facto aascii117thentication mechanism of the web. Perhaps yoascii117 are sick of having to remember yoascii117r login details at every different website yoascii117 go to (becaascii117se it is wrong to ascii117se the same password everywhere; if one site gets hacked then yoascii117r online identity is compromised): he wants to make it possible for yoascii117 to log in everywhere ascii117sing jascii117st yoascii117r Facebook identity, which of coascii117rse is almost always yoascii117r 'real' identity. (What happens if yoascii117r Facebook login gets stolen? Ah, that is a different problem.)

For Google, still the biggest and most widely ascii117sed search engine (even if it is not the biggest in Rascii117ssia or China), Facebooks changes are yet another example of how social networking, a trick it has never mastered, still remains oascii117t of reach. Despite laascii117nching Google+, its own social networking service, to the world earlier this week, it lags behind by aboascii117t 680 million ascii117sers.

Facebook, meanwhile, is mascii117tating before oascii117r eyes: no longer an evanescent startascii117p, now a giant. MySpace, Bebo, Friends Reascii117nited: they are the past. Facebook more and more looks like the fascii117tascii117re.

2011-09-23 01:09:02