I remember Facebook recently implemented their controversial Face detecting module. Privacy advocates were freaked out because Facebook was trying to automatically tag people in photos simply based on face recognition.
I assume they're going to be moving forward in that regard by acquiring Face.com's tech.
Facebook have been using face.com for face detection and recognition for a while. I guess they were happy enough with the results that they wanted control of the technology (and/or to stop others from using it)
Could it be that the license to process the volume facebook has in mind is near or higher than the price of the company? I don't know the price model for the face API but it's not unreasonable to consider a tipping point.
I assume they're going to be moving forward in that regard by acquiring Face.com's tech.