It looks like Facebook really wants to stay on top, as would any industry leader.  According to a Reuters report, Facebook’s revenue is doubled to $1.6 billion in first half of the year. The net income during the same period has touched to almost $500 million. Its growing popularity among investors and advertisers has pushed the company’s valuation to nearly $80 billion. In the first nine months of 2010, Facebook has earned nearly $355 million in net income.

In one of the other major development, Erskine B. Bowles has joined Facebook as one of its board member. Bowles was a former co-chairman of the Obama administration’s deficit-reduction commission program. Facebook had recently added Netflix chief Reed Hastings to its board as well.  The addition of board members is an indication of Facebook’s leadership position in Internet social networking, as it is looking to strengthen its board to go public as early next year.

“Erskine has held important roles in government, academia and business which have given him insight into how to build organizations and navigate complex issues,” Mr. Zuckerberg, CEO of Facebook said in a statement. “Along with his experience founding companies, this will be very valuable as we continue building new things to help make the world more open and connected.”

f8 hits a musical note

Facebook is also planning to launch a music service at their annual f8 conference scheduled for the third week of September, 2011 in San Francisco. The music service will allow users to share songs through Facebook the same way as they do movies, links and videos. The music service will compete with Apple’s iTunes in some regards, letting users stream free music or pay monthly for unlimited access.

The music cloud is big business, as Google and Amazon recently started their cloud music services that allow uploading of music to remote servers and the option to listen to music remotely.  RIM has also just launched their BBM Music service that allows users to share and swap music in the BBM music library for $4.99 per month.

The luxury of privacy

Over the past few days, Facebook announced lots of changes to the way the site will work, mainly on privacy settings.  Privacy has been a hot issue for Facebook for some time, as many people grew concerned with what they share and how Facebook maintains their data. Facebook has re-designed its pages to make it easier to share posts, photos, tags and other content with exactly the people you want.  Facebook has also allowed people to share their location along with their thoughts in real time through smartphones.