Facebook gets set to launch television app

Facebook has already become a major player in global elections and starred in its own Hollywood movie while dominating social media — now it’s moving into living rooms with a new standalone TV app.

After launching on desktop computers and mastering smartphones, Facebook is taking on YouTube and Netflix in the music and video markets with a video app that will enable owners of Apple TV, Amazon’s Fire TV and Samsung’s Smart TVs to watch user-generated clips, shows, or music content directly on their big screens.

It comes after Mark Zuckerberg’s 13-year-old business began paying publishers and celebrities for exclusive “premium” video content, and pushing its Facebook Live feature, which allows users to stream live events, which have ranged from political rallies and births to at least one suicide.

For now, Facebook will only say the feature is coming “soon” and hasn’t elaborated how it will affect revenues — if the social network makes exclusive, popular video content free, relying on advertising to pay for it, that could hit subscriber services from the likes of Netflix and Amazon Prime.