[aprendo]

If it works like the Twitter integration it won’t be problem. You have to explicitly enter your name and password in the preferences. It won’t bug you, it won’t even be visible until you decide to take part. You have to care about it as much as you now care about the Chinese services Apple integrated.

Though I really do not understand your allergic reaction. Facebook seems like a tremendously useful tool to me since I always know that everyone is there. You don’t have to like it, you don’t have to use it – but you should at least be able to appreciate how valuable such an integration is to a great many people.

[nathan_long]

>> I really do not understand your allergic reaction

Two reasons. 1) I dislike Facebook. They have little regard for privacy and I see interaction with the site as mostly a cheapening of friendships. Everything about it - from "friend our company on Facebook and we'll enter you in a drawing" to the data-mining advertising model - makes my skin crawl. 2) Why is Apple picking services to integrate? I can install a Facebook app if I want it. I wouldn't want them pre-installing a pizza ordering app from their favorite pizza company. Let me pick. If I didn't ask for it, it's backroom-deal crapware, same as the pre-installed antivirus on cheap Windows boxes.

[bmelton]

I have to agree that seems a little petty.

Facebook is a top 2 website on the internet, with ~845 million users last I checked. Do you really think that it had to be a 'backroom deal' for a technology company to want to integrate with the second largest internet company in the world? (First largest if you ignore direct competitors) Does it really surprise you that they would integrate in such a way?

To put it bluntly, it shouldn't.