2007年，谷歌称不会推出“谷歌手机”；2009年，谷歌改称不会推出“谷歌”品牌的手机，结果Android出世了。2008年，微软也坚称不会推出Zune手机，结果Windows Phone 7冒泡了；苹果也不例外，一再声称不会推出苹果手机，结果呢？iPhone手机不但上市了，而且现在还后浪推前浪，更新升级好几代了。Facebook尽管坚决否认，但相信也难逃这个规律。

Facebook denys the rumor

Faceboo公关人员今早反驳了我们昨晚的报道，称Facebook将推出手机的消息纯粹是谣言，但我们认为最准确的解释应该是：Facebook没有制造手机。

如果我们的报道并非真相，那就存在4种可能：1）我们得到的是错误消息；2）Facebook在扯谎；3）Facebook所说的是他们自己理解的事实；4）Facebook的公关人员并不知道有这么一回事。

根据我们所了解的情况，很容易排除第一种可能，也姑且假定Facebook没有隐瞒事实，第四种情况也有可能，但实在很难让人信服，Facebook员工怎么可能对自己公司的项目一无所知？我们情愿相信是Facebook为保守机密，让公关人员啥也别说，现在看来，最有可能的就是第三种情况，即Facebook对此事另有一套解释。

“Facebook没有制造手机”，只是表明Facebook没有生产自己的手机硬件，更何况他们也没有自己的手机厂房，Facebook员工也确实没有在工厂里头亲手制造手机。但这并不意味着Facebook就不会效仿谷歌，推出自己的手机运行系统，投放第三方制造的手机硬件，这也是苹果等其他同行的一贯路数。Facebook虽然不会亲自制造手机实体产品，但你不能因此认定他们不会涉足手机领域，就好像“香蕉共和国”这一品牌的服装制作业务全部外包给亚洲国家，可你也还是得承认它就是一个时装品牌。

Facebook准备如何在手机领域发力，我们暂时不得而知，但相信Facebook已经派遣了一个精英部队为该项目效力，Facebook当然可以像其他同行一样决不松口，直到手机产品真正上市了，大家才知道又被忽悠了一把。

Facebook Is Not Working On A Phone Just Like Google Was Not Working On A Phone

In 2007, Google said it wasn’t working on a Google Phone. In 2009, Google said it wasn’t working on its own branded phone. In 2008, Microsoft said it wasn’t working on a Zune Phone. Leading up to the iPhone unveiling, we heard an Apple phone wasn’t coming. Guess what? All those projects were very real. And the Facebook Phone project will prove to be no different.

Perhaps you read our story from late last night that Facebook is working on its own phone. This morning, Facebook PR has begun countering that story, saying that our report “is not accurate.” Sorry, did I say “countering”? I meant “spinning”.

If you read their statement, it goes on and on about how important the mobile space is to Facebook and technologies like HTML5 and their own Connect are central to what they’re working on. It’s all vague PR babble that actually doesn’t mean a whole lot. In fact, the only thing that does is this: “Facebook is not building a phone.”

There are a few possibilities here. 1) Our sources on this are wrong. 2) Facebook is lying. 3) Facebook is telling their own version of the truth. 4) This is a need-to-know basis project and Facebook PR doesn’t need to know.

We going to say that based on what we’ve learned, what can safely rule out number one. We’re also going to give Facebook the benefit of the doubt and rule out number two — for now. Number four is possible, but seems unlikely. We have to believe that Facebook would simply tell their PR department to say nothing at all, if they didn’t want to brief them on the project. So that leaves number three.

By saying “Facebook is not building a phone,” what the company likely means is that they won’t be manufacturing their own hardware. Right. We never said that they were. As far as we know, Facebook doesn’t own hardware manufacturing plants, so how would they? This is the same type of semantic caveat Google kept using in saying they were not working a phone. Okay, there aren’t actually Google employees in the plants building them, just like there won’t be Facebook employees building them piece by piece.

Instead, Facebook, like Google, is likely working on its own mobile operating system (maybe even based on Android — we admittedly don’t have a lot of details at this point) that will be tied to hardware built by a third party. That’s exactly what we said in the first paragraph of our post last night:

Facebook is building a mobile phone, says a source who has knowledge of the project. Or rather, they’re building the software for the phone and working with a third party to actually build the hardware. Which is exactly what Apple and everyone else does, too.

So, yes, technically they’re not physically building a phone, I suppose. But that’s sort of like saying Banana Republic isn’t in the clothing business because they outsource the actual shirt-making to Asia.

But my favorite part of the statement is this:

For an example, check out Connect for iPhone and the integration we have with contact syncing through our iPhone app.  Another example is the INQ1 phone with Facebook integration (the first so-called ‘Facebook Phone’). The people mentioned in the story are working on these projects.

So a chief architect of Firefox (with a ton of OS and mobile OS experience), a chief architect of Chrome OS, and the former product lead of Android are working on the INQ1 phone?

We may not know the specifics about what Facebook is up to with regard to their own phone, but we know they have a very talented team working on the project. And Facebook can deny it all they want right up to the day it’s released.（source：techcrunch）

声明：本文中文为游戏邦翻译，英文原文采用techcrunch，转载请保留版权信息，谢谢！