For years, Facebook has been stuck with his only product, the website. Bit since its expansion into the hardware with Portal & Oculus, Facebook has eventually grown to use the modified version of Android on both devices, making it dependent on both Google and the Android open source project. According to the latest update from the company, Facebook is looking to bring its Software in-house with a custom operating system that would apparently replace Android. Apparently, Facebook has hired one of the original Windows NT architects and appointed him to head the entire project.
This original report came out from the information that had many details going beyond the existence of this project. As per the information, Mark Lucovsky, a veteran of Microsoft has been hired by Facebook where he co-authored the Windows NT operating system. Windows NTunderpins Microsoft’s software stack to the present day with Windows 10. There are very few people who have the knowledge of building an operating system successfully from scratch, and Mark Lucovsky is one of them.
Although Facebook has not confirmed the report, still the company’s head, Andrew Bosworth has confirmed that the company is looking towards new future possibilities. He said “We really want to make sure the next generation has space for us. We don’t think we can trust the marketplace or competitors to ensure that’s the case. And so we’re gonna do it ourselves.”
The primary concern of Facebook here is Oculus, a leading VR space. After a few slow years, VR is now staking off. There is a lot that we don’t know about how people will want to interact with immersive software. Starting from the very scratch might help Facebook to figure it out. Oculus, a platform that relies upon the developer support and we have to say that Android is not a very friendly development platform.
This is not the first attempt made by Facebook to work in owning the software experience. Back in 2013, Facebook partnered up with HTC to launch HTC’s first Android phone with a Facebook-based UI layer known as Facebook Home. As per the review of the device the best thing about it as that it was equipped to disable Facebook Home & have a competent, nearly stock Android experience.
In 2013, Facebook having control over the software experience might not have been an issue, but we live in a different world. The repetitive privacy violation as well an Iax security practices have led to the intense scrutiny against it. Following the prior experience, it seems that the company is taking a great risk as we are not sure whether the VR headset will be welcomed by the people or not.
