Facebook acquires another mobile-centric photo sharing service, which begs the question, “What is Facebook really up to?”

What’s Facebook’s plan?

Facebook is getting aggressive with their acquisitions in recent weeks.  Aside from Lightbox, they also took in Instagram and more recently Glancee, the social discovery app for iOS and Android that lets users find new people based on their location.  Users can download their Glancee data here if they’d like to back it up.

You can also export your Lightbox photos here.

Glancee co-founders Andrea Vaccari, Alberto Tretti and Gabriel Grise will be joining the Facebook team at the Menlo Park HQ.

So is everything just about talent acquisitions?

I don’t think so.  Sure, Facebook needs great people in order to create great products, but what they are also doing is eliminating potential competition.  It’s better to eliminate the weeds from the roots than just cut it from the top.

The other possible goal is Facebook’s likely preparing to launch a unifying product for mobile devices and the web, a necessity for the social network moving forward.

Analysts see the acquisitions as less than subtle hints of things to come for Facebook.  The social network doesn’t have a long history of buying companies, but it’s jumped into the acquisition pool with zeal this year, indicating some impending changes at Facebook.  The common denomenator so far seems to be a heavy interest in mobile content sharing.

“Facebook’s interest in a particular area can hint at a shift in strategy or a new feature of the service.,” said an article on the New York Times.  “For example, the company’s recent purchase of Tagtile, a customer loyalty service, suggests that it is gearing up for a move into coupon deals, an area in which Google, Amazon, eBay and Foursquare have begun to dabble.”