• The New York Times, Thursday, August 25, 2011 11:58 AM

Over the next few months, Facebook is expected to debut a series of photo filters to its mobile application. Calling the move a direct attack on Instagram, the popular photo-sharing application, The New York Times writes: "Get ready for the photo-filter wars to begin." Unnamed Facebook engineers say the effort follows an unsuccessful attempt to buy Instagram outright.

Facebook is thus launching almost a dozen photo filters, "including some that are similar to Instagram like old-style camera lenses and grainy film." Facebook is also expected to float new styles of filters with what NYT says are "hopes of drawing users away from other photo apps."

Along with Instagram and other upstarts, however, Facebook likely faces increasing competition from Apple, as programming code found in the upcoming release of iOS 5 revealed a series of new photo filters. After discovering this code, TechCrunch suggested that the filters would likely be integrated directly into Apple's mobile platform.

Read the whole story at The New York Times »