Facebook and HTC Not Dealing to Make Facebook Phone

Sorry online socialites, but it does not appear that Facebook will be launching a branded phone anytime in the immediate future. The company has denied published reports that it's working with HTC on such a device.

In the last few days, various media outlets picked up on an exclusive run by the City A.M., a London based financial paper, that claimed Facebook was launching a mobile phone.

Turns out that HTC is just developing a unique method of offering Facebook on some new devices, as big names at Facebook flatly denied the City A.M.’s claims.

Dan Rose, Facebook’s head of business development, spoke on the mistaken information: "This is really just another example of a manufacturer who has taken our public APIs [application programming interfaces] and integrated them into their device in an interesting way … The rumors around there being something more to this HTC device are overblown."

These days, all smartphones have apps that can connect them to Facebook, and many mobile operating systems even go so far as to integrate this wildly popular social networking service directly into their user interface.

This isn't the first time there has been a false announcement of Facebook throwing a phone into the market, as a very similar instance occurred last September when there was a mix-up between "deep integration" and a legitimate Facebook mobile offering.

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