Do you know how much Apps Facebook integrates within its system? Some of them are separated, but a lot of the features are bundled in the main app and expanding.
User Authentication System
This is the front line of any meaningful service. Facebook has several – under the Facebook App, the Instagram App, WhatsApp App and more. They have massive databases login credentials (emails and passwords) – with full names, addresses, phone numbers, even credit or debit cards, age, individual preferences, psychological profiles and more.
Code Generator
If you’ve activated second pass authentication on any service, you know what I’m talking about. Any bank nowadays has these temporary time-based numbers. Facebook has its own – build-in unlike Google Authenticator that allows external apps to register secrets that are used for the temp numbers.
User Notification Service
The users could be notified about whatever events and interactions that they find important. Having notifications and Push Notifications is one of the things what makes Facebook so addictive. They are an amalgam of SMS and Email for the Internet Age.
Connection Management System
Every User has the feature to add “friends” or connections. Every user could create – visible only for him lists of friends that could be based on the source of connection or some interest. This feature you may use if you want privacy. When sharing you could specify what is visible for whom. You could share programming content only to the developers in the list, medical articles – only to the doctors, dancing – only to the salsa hobbyist and so on.
Authentication Service Provider
One of the ways they’ve spread so much is exposing this databases to developers to plug-in Authentication and User Data – Service Provider. Facebook has done poor job of protecting their own user databases and several big leaks has become famous.
Device (+ IP) White Listing
Theoretically IP White Listing could be a separate service. The same as User Initiated Backchannel Approval (very similar to CIBA, but having only the user as an actor from both sides). Whenever a new Successful authentication happens, for security reasons – Facebook demands approval from other – already active – user sessions.
News Feed
Want to now what is going on in the World or with your friends? There is – where you go. The main feature of the feed is the endless scroll popularized by Google Reader long ago. You’ll see the stuff that your peers interacted and some content that is associated to you based on your profile. It is a collection, a union, a central intersection of every other app besides the content from the messenger.
Messenger
Facebook owns several implementations of communicating systems – Facebook Messenger, Instagram DM, WhatsApp…
“Rooms” for Group of interests
They have implemented groups in the Facebook App – where the new stuff in the rooms is like the news feed. The other implementation of groups is in the messaging apps. The priority there is often much higher for the user – than the one from the news feed.
Dating App
They’ve released it this year (2021) I think. It is a never-aging concept for connecting people based on their sexual needs and desires.
Marketplace
Have something to sell as an individual? Publish it and use the user base of Facebook as a potential buyers.
E-shop
If you sell from a business that is not yet big enough and don’t need much control or customization, you could set-up a shop directly into the Facebook Pages and Artists. No need for e-commerce sites and external platforms like WordPress & Woo Commerce, PrestaShop, Shopify and other, that require know how, investments, and so on.
Blog CMS
You could write articles that integrate nicely into Facebook and that do not redirect the user outside of the Platform.
Business and Artist Pages
Having your own Brand has never been easier. Within it, you could include shop, blog, share whatever links, videos, live streams and so on.
Location & Business / Artist Rating System
Every business or artist is rate-able within the platform. This in itself could be a separate app.
Games
Many games are integrated directly in the platform. A user may receive their news and notifications even while playing.
Job Openings
Facebook entered into the Job Marketplace battle with its own section for jobs – grouped in roles, skills, geographic locations and so on.
Events app
Events fill up an important social part of the news feed. Who is going to what place, where? Facebook even Published their own app for events .
Birth-Day, Name-Day, National and other official days
This is a little bit more personal and specific module of the events app that brings people and social groups together.
TV/YouTube like system
On Facebook you could watch already recorded content and also Real-Time Live Streams of important to you channels or individuals.
User Image Gallery
Before the raise of Instagram that Facebook bought, having the tagging feature inside the images helped a lot for the expansion of the Platform. To this day, people like to flex and show-off. Human nature.
Short Stories App
This feature is copied from Snapchat and is present in both Instagram and Facebook.
Instagram Rails
This is the equivalent of Tik-Tok. Zuckerberg decided that it will pollute too much the Facebook app, so they’ve added this feature to Instagram.
Comment Service
Having comment section build-in in every small other type of component also helps the Platform to be addictive. People like to comment other people. The feature is also available as plugin to 3-rd party web sites – similar to Disqus and others.
Reaction Module
People want to react to content in a different shiny ways. This is how the Ford lost their lead in the car industry. Facebook has 7 primary ways to react, with more ways available in statuses, emojis, photo edits and other places.
Weather
The Facebook app has even weather predictions.
Advertisement System
It will a miss not to point out the most important App plugged into Facebook – the ad serving feature. This is from where the company makes most of the money. It will not be stopped by European GDPR nor the incoming privacy features of Apples iOS or Google experiments to bypass GDPR.