Your Facebook app is about get a lot smarter at knowing what you’re listening to and watching on TV.
In an upcoming update in the App Store, Facebook will add the ability to automatically tag music and TV shows within a status update. The Shazam-like feature will have to be manually enabled by the user, and links to songs and shows will be attached to statuses in the News Feed. Facebook hopes the feature encourages people to share more, while it’s sure to cause some users to worry about sharing too much.
“When writing a status update – if you choose to turn the feature on – you’ll have the option to use your phone’s microphone to identify what song is playing or what show or movie is on TV,” explains Facebook. “That means if you want to share that you’re listening to your favorite Beyoncé track or watching the season premiere of Game of Thrones, you can do it quickly and easily, without typing.”
Songs will be displayed with 30-second preview links from Spotify. Both music and TV tagging will be limited to users in the U.S, unfortunately. The update will roll out to U.S Facebook users over the next few weeks.
You’ve already been able to tell Facebook what you’re listening to manually, but now the app will be able to do the heavy lifting on its own. Facebook recently added previewing for status updates in its iOS app, and content sharing suggestions are being shown to some users after sharing.
Facebook says it doesn’t store any audio recordings. What the iPhone’s mic picks up is instantly analyzed and then the data is thrown away.
Facebook isn’t the only one getting interested in Shazam-like audio recognition. Apple is expected to partner with Shazam itself for a music tagging feature in iOS 8, which will be unveiled during the WWDC keynote on June 2nd.
Source: Facebook
