Why a Facebook Smartphone? – Kyle Baxter →

What better way to get more people using their platform and using it even more than they do now than by (1) making the other platforms—iOS and Android—commodities, and (2) making a device that makes Facebook the operating system?

Speaking of Facebook. If Facebook does want to be web or the platform that everyone uses to communicate then sure, why not expand their “phone app” to enclose the entire phone operating system? And why the phone? Because it is the most personal item, in many cases, that we own and actually carry around. All day. Every day.

Gowalla aimed to tell our story as we visited places by giving others an insight into where we are instead of just me telling you. A point that Facebook doesn’t do at the moment. Not well. Facebook check ins are sort of dead. There is no excitement behind them.

Facebook has nailed communication and helped establish digital links and connections. The connections have been established, but I think it’s fair to say that Facebook sucks at telling that story. Just look at how many times profiles have been revised in recent years. Gowalla could be the missing piece that will add that level of interactivity that is missing.