Facebook's new app replaces home screen on Android phones?

Facebook unveiled its most ambitious attempt yet to enter mobile computing without a phone of its own, introducing a new app that replaces the home screen on some Android smartphones, as reported by reuters.

Called "Home," the new software lets users comprehensively modify Android, the popular mobile operating system developed by Google (GOOG.O), to prominently display their Facebook newsfeed and messages on the home screens of a wide range of devices - while hiding other apps.

"Why do we need to go into those apps in the first place to see what's going on with those we care about?" Facebook Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg told the hundreds of reporters and industry executives gathered at the company's Menlo Park campus.

The "Home" software will be available for download for free from Google Play starting April 12. In addition, AT&T has exclusive rights to sell for $100 the first handsets, made by Taiwan's HTC, that come pre-installed with the software starting the same day. France Telecom's Orange will be offering the phone in Europe.

Analysts say should the new software take off, it may begin to draw users away from Google services. Offering Facebook messaging, social networking and photos on the very first screen that Android users see could divert attention from the panoply of services, such as search and email, which generate advertising revenue for Google.
Instead of traditional wallpaper or a "lock screen," users with Home installed will see a new Facebook "cover feed" that displays a rolling ticker-tape of photos, status updates - and eventually, ads - from Facebook's network.

Facebook's executives, acknowledging that messaging and communications remain the most fundamental use for smartphones, also showed off a new "chat heads" messaging interface, which would combine SMS text messages and Facebook chat messages under one tool.
"On one level, this is just next mobile version of Facebook," Zuckerberg said. "At a deeper level, this can start to be a change in the relationship with how we use these computing devices."

People who used the software and the HTC phone on Thursday appeared impressed by the highly visual design and interface that featured a multitude of pictures. But analysts say the jury is still out on whether Home has appeal beyond habitual Facebook users.
Some were skeptical consumers would leap at the chance to make Facebook so central to their lives.

"Facebook thinks it's more important to people than it actually is," said Charles Golvin, an analyst at Forrester Research.

Golvin said that in markets like Spain and Brazil, mobile users spend far more time in messaging apps like Whatsapp compared to the Facebook app.

"For the vast majority of people, Facebook just isn't the be-all and end-all of their mobile experience. It's just one part," he said. "I see a more apathetic response among Facebook users than Facebook might be expecting."