With over 750 million users worldwide, online companies are taking aim at Facebook to fight for consumers’ time and advertising dollars, but Facebook doesn’t plan on backing down anytime soon. Amidst the notable launch of Google+, CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced last week that Facebook would be launching “something awesome” this week during a press conference for media members. The news event will take place tomorrow at Facebook’s headquarters located in Palo Alto, California.

While touring the company’s 40-person engineering campus in Seattle, Zuckerberg said that the announcement would be about something that was developed there at the site – which plays a major role in the mobile arena for Facebook. Although there are numerous rumors regarding the announcement, it is speculated that the company will either be launching the long-anticipated Apple iPad app or new features such as a photo-sharing app and video-chat powered by Skype. The two well-known brands, Facebook and Skype, have already entered into a partnership that integrates the social media outlet with clients for Skype. When Skype was purchased by Microsoft in May, the connection between Facebook and Skype became even more entrenched, as Microsoft bought a $240 million piece of the Facebook pie in 2007.

Facebook has taken its own steps in trying to make any transition to Google+ more difficult by blocking Facebook Friend Exporter, a Google Chrome extension that let’s users extract contact information their friends have shared with them via Facebook and import them elsewhere. After Google+ was announced last week, one of the first to create an account was Mark Zuckerberg – who ironically has the most followers… even more than Google CEO Larry Page.

 

 

 

Photo by Doug Gross via CNN