Apple Soon To Be In A Relationship With Facebook Through iOS 6?

Is iOS about to "like" Facebook? According to a report by TechCrunch's MG Siegler, the answer is yes. Systemwide integration with the hugely popular social network is said to be among the new features that will be introduced in the forthcoming major release of Apple's mobile operating system. Codenamed "Sundance," iOS 6 has already been conjectured to include significant changes mainly affecting Apple's stock apps, including Maps and Photos. The addition of Facebook integration in iOS 6 is presumably more significant, especially since it's been a long time coming. It seems that this could be among the things being hinted at by Apple CEO Tim Cook with his "stay tuned" comment at D10 regarding the tech giant's partnership with Facebook. Traces of Facebook integration have been found in previous developer builds of iOS 4, but it was ultimately not built into that version of iOS. Instead, Apple found a partner in another widely used social network when it introduced Twitter integration in iOS 5. Apple and Facebook have disagreed in the past, most notably about the latter's "onerous" terms surrounding its interconnectivity with the iTunes-based social network Ping. But Facebook's presence on iOS has never been as visible as it is today. There is, of course, Facebook's suite of iOS apps comprising its main iOS client, Messenger, Pages Manager, and Camera. And then there's also its billion-dollar iOS app acquisition, Instagram. The imminent implementation of Facebook integration should only make its presence on the platform more widely felt. But whether it will be as well-received as Twitter integration was, given the prevalence of Facebook aversion among iOS users, remains to be seen. Source: TechCrunch