A DAY after the mobile phone celebrated its 40th birthday, Facebook has produced something that it hopes will make certain of the devices even more useful. On April 4th the giant social network unveiled Home, new software that is designed to give it more prominence on mobile phones powered by Android, an operating system developed by Google. This matters because more and more folk are now accessing social networks from mobile devices rather than from desktop computers and because mobile advertising revenues are growing fast, albeit from a low base. Without a robust mobile presence, Facebook could see some of its users siphoned off by rivals born in the mobile era. And it could miss out on a potentially massive source of new revenue.

There had been speculation that Facebook was working on a phone of its own, or at least on a mobile operating system to rival Android or Apple’s iOS. But dabbling in hardware at this stage of its development would be a huge risk for Facebook and developing a rival operating system would risk alienating Apple and Google, whose mobile platforms have helped power its advertising growth. EMarketer, a research firm, reckons Facebook is on track to win 11% of the $13.6 billion likely to be spent around the world on mobile ads this year.

Home, which is a group of Facebook apps, avoids both pitfalls. Among other things, it converts a phone’s home screen (and lock screen) to Facebook’s Newsfeed, allowing people to get updates on what their friends are doing without having to launch a dedicated app each time they want news. A phone using Home will also notify you when your friends are doing something new, as well as alerting you to new data from other apps. Another feature is a tool called "Chat Heads" that combines Facebook's message system with a phone's regular SMS message offering. This means messages pop up on the home screen along with the sender's profile picture, which is enclosed in a small circle.

The first phone built to showcase Home, which will be made by HTC with wireless service provided by AT&T, will go on sale in America on April 12th for about $100. Users of some other Android-powered devices made by Samsung and HTC will be able to download the software starting the same day and Facebook says it will roll out Home more broadly later in the year. But not, it seems, to rival operating systems yet. At the launch of Home, Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook’s boss, made a point of stressing how “open” Android was and how easy it was to change the look of the operating system without too much work. Apple is likely to prove a much tougher nut to crack, as it exercises much tighter control over the look and feel of its operating system. Microsoft, which has a close relationship with Facebook, may be the next Home base.

Facebook is convinced that people will want a phone designed around people rather than apps. Some no doubt will. But previous attempts to produce “Facebook phones”, including the ChaCha from HTC, which allowed people to post photos directly to Facebook with the press of a physical button, have hardly been wildly successful. And folk are likely to be less than thrilled when Facebook starts pushing ads onto the home screens of their phones, which will inevitably happen given the firm’s track record. So don’t expect Home to be a home run for the social network.

(Photo credit: AFP)