Facebook Building “Buffy” Social Phone With HTC On Tap

Facebook’s long-rumored social smartphone has again cropped up in the tech media, and reportedly, development on it is well underway.

The onslaught of reports about the new phone – rumored to be codenamed “Buffy” after the seductive vampire killer heroine of that show from the late 90s – comes from All Things Digital which said earlier on Monday that “Facebook has tapped Taiwanese cellphone maker HTC to build a smartphone that has the social network integrated at the core of its being.”

However, Facebook is reported to have also once considered Samsung to build “Buffy”, but it chose HTC. I do not know why Samsung was not chosen, but maybe it’s because Facebook already has a relationship with HTC because of the HTC Chacha (that phone with the dedicated Facebook button at the bottom part of the front of the phone). Nonetheless, HTC is a very capable company and we have no doubt it can deliver a great phone.

The “Buffy” will surpass the Chacha, however, as it is said in the report that Facebook will be the “integrated at the core of its being”.

Citing unnamed sources who are reportedly familiar with the “Buffy” project, All Things D says that the new phone will be powered by “a modified version of Android that Facebook has tweaked heavily to deeply integrate its services, as well as to support HTML5 as a platform for applications”.

Think of heavy customization along the lines of what Amazon did with its Kindle Fire. It does run on Android, but it has been thoroughly customized by the company.

According to the report, the “Buffy” project is helmed by Facebook CTO Bret Taylor. Nonetheless, Facebook fans who are excited to have a phone for themselves will have to wait as the report says that “Buffy” will not land yet until about a year or a year and a half into the future.