Facebook’s ‘Listen With Button’ Makes Music More Social

Back in September, Facebook announced Ticker, real-time streaming of everything that’s happening on Facebook. One of Ticker’s features: the capability to see what songs and albums your friends are listening to, also in real time.

Today, Facebook is taking that a step further by making music a bit more social: Not only can you see what your friends are listening to, you can listen with them.

Unlike the music notifications you see in your Ticker from Spotify or other music apps, this new feature is found within your Facebook Chat application. You can tell when your friends are listening to music by the musical note icon that appears next to their name.

Listening with your friends is simple—just hover over their name and click the “Listen with” button. The music will then play through the service your friend is using.

Listening Privacy: Only the people you’ve shared your listening activity with can see when you’re listening with a friend. That friend will also know if you’re listening with them.

If you’re unsure of whether or not you’re sharing your listening activity, visit your music app’s privacy settings or check out your App Settings page and adjust them appropriately.

Facebook is rolling out this feature over the next several weeks, so if you don’t have it yet, stay tuned.