Facebook, the dominator of social networking worldwide with over 250 million users worldwide to date - is a very useful service. I spend quite a lot of time on it, and check what my friends are doing, engage in discussions, check pictures of people I normally wouldn’t see for a long time, and I have some time to virtually catch up, which is nice and efficient. I generally like the service.

I also like Facebook Mobile - being on so many mobile platforms, specifically the “nice” mobile platforms like the iPhone and Android, and also having a mobile web version. It’s OK, but not great. Facebook seriously lacks development in the mobile platform. Why is that? Facebook has been developed so quickly recently, that I believe they didn’t have time to catch-up with the mobile platforms. I hope they do that soon.

Facebook Mobile product issues

• Different platform, different quality - On each platform that runs some sort of Facebook applicaiton, you run into different quality. To be specific - iPhone runs a great Facebook application, but try it for example on the high quality latest Nokias (still, majority of the market), it works really bad. No photo uploading from mobile web, no photo uploading applications, and even in applications where photo uploading is available, it doesn’t work (despite being embedded on the phone, not a download) - for example like with the latest Nokia N97
• Applications and statuses - If for example I write a status via an application on Facebook, the mobile users will not get this status - also, the mobile web version is missing things like
• Detection issues - Facebook probably might even use the typical WURFL detection - as on the mobile web, it detects a Nokia N97 as Nokia 5800 XpressMusic, which is a wierd thing to do for a normal user.
• Contacts synchronisation - Somewhere where Facebook could absolutely excel is offering great contact synchronisation with your mobile phone - none of this is available - you have to enter Facebook to go and call a friend - no synchronisation or “offline” application is available - I don’t mind ads from time to time
• Chat - A great feature in the Facebook platform - the chat function is not available for the mobile platform - which is too bad for Facebook. I am sure many people would come to like this.

Facebook Mobile Commercial and connectivity issues

• Underdeveloped or no Facebook Connect - can’t be used for any other platforms then iPhone - has been used in Android devices, but nothing officlal yet
• Missing API’s for Facebook mobile - Currently other then the iPhone Connect, there is no way to develope Facebook connected mobile applications. This is a pitty, as there are many developers out there who would develop for this platform
• Mobile advertising not like the web advertising -  No offense to the companies providing the mobile advertising on Facebook, but there is nothing like the web experience of the Facebook advertising system, and that from my perspective should stay exactly the same on mobile

Tags: facebook, facebook android, facebook iphone, facebook mobile, facebook Nokia, Facebook Nokia N97