You may have noticed your Facebook profile photo and sharing options disappeared off your PS4 without explanation recently. It isn't a glitch, and it isn't just you. A PlayStation Support post confirms that Sony has removed all Facebook integration from PS4. It doesn't say why, but a follow-up statement Facebook gave to Kotaku indicates it's a contractual issue that won't last long.
If it's been a while since you linked your Facebook account to your PS4, you may be surprised by all the stuff it helped power (and is now absent from). The most obvious example is being able to publish game photos and videos straight to your Facebook profile with the Share button. The connection also did a lot of work to make friend lists more manageable: it could automatically suggest adding people who were your Facebook friends but not your PSN friends, and it could display your Facebook profile photo instead of your PSN photo to specifically selected close friends, for example.
Though the PlayStation Support post sounds pretty final, Facebook's statement positions the whole business as a brief interruption that will end with a better product.
"We're working with Sony to finalize an updated contract designed to improve the Facebook integration on PlayStation," the statement says. "While these discussions are in progress, Facebook features will not be available on PlayStation 4. We hope to bring these features back as soon as our teams reach agreement."
There are many reasons to be skeptical about anything integrating with Facebook after its various privacy concerns. That said, I'm up for pretty much anything that keeps me from having to repopulate my friends list every damn time I buy a new video game system. Hopefully Facebook's statement is accurate and it links back up with PS4 soon.
Sony's console got some new stuff this week too - check out what's waiting for you in PS4 system software update 7.0.
