Steve Jobs and Mark Zuckerberg met a couple of weeks ago, and rumor has it that Apple is still trying to convince Facebook to allow iTunes Ping, its recently launched music-oriented social network, to work with Facebook Connect. If negotiations succeed, the partnership could be a stepping stone towards a solid partnership. Apple and Facebook could (and should) do a lot more together.

First, let’s take a look at why Apple needs Facebook. iTunes Ping is failing to attract many users and risks becoming as irrelevant as Google Buzz. Apple’s GameCenter, a social network centered around iPhone and iPod Touch games, was supposed to emulate XBOX Live’s success, but its slowly growing user base indicates this is more dream than reality. Gaming remains the most popular category in Apple’s App Store, yet it is rare to find friends in the GameCenter. The problem has less to do with a lack of friends playing iPhone games, and more to do with starting out with zero GameCenter friends and having to invite them one by one.

Steve Jobs asininely thinks he can pull off iTunes Ping and GameCenter without much support from others. Sure, Apple has historically done well despite its walled garden and vertical integration approach, but the current glut of established social networking sites makes it extraordinarily difficult to create a new, viable social network. With around 500 million members, Facebook is the enviable, premiere social network — a stronghold that even Google has failed to shake, despite its repeated attempts with Google Buzz, Orkut, OpenSocial, and Google Wave. Unless something radical happens, personal social networking space has already tipped in favor of Facebook.

In other words, “wind” is blowing from contacts to content, not the other way around. Because so many contacts are on Facebook, it is in a strong position to market greater and more personalized content. In contrast, iTunes has content, but it’s not enough to attract friends and thereby market more content to more users. This is precisely why Facebook Connect is so powerful — it instantly tells users via news feeds which Facebook friends are using which particular service, and thereby helps extend the social graph of that service. It has helped turn around sparsely populated networks like Friendfeed (now part of Facebook itself) and remains the tool of choice for many niche social networks and services. Apple should tag along and reap the benefits while it can.

If it doesn’t, Microsoft will with its Windows Phone, which is expected to have deeper integration with Facebook. Since the Windows Phone is a clear underdog in the mobile apps and smartphone market, Microsoft won’t hesitate to strike partnerships that can make its offering distinctive.  The current generation prefers staying in touch via social networking as opposed to phone calls, so expect the Facebook Phone or any other phone that partners with Facebook to become immensely popular.

There is a lot more that Apple’s iOS could achieve with deeper integration with Facebook. For example, Apple could improve the experience of its App Store. The oft raised problem of the inability to discover apps amongst the hundreds of thousands will be partially solved with Facebook. The App Store could allow individuals to see which iPhone apps their Facebook friends downloaded, and therefore provide a strong recommendation engine. Several games and apps have become incredibly popular on Facebook despite minimal marketing expenditure.

A major question is whether Apple will lose power if it does partner with Facebook. If Facebook can go so deep in the operating system, its potential to do more is troubling (for example, it could conceivably sync all media to Facebook in the cloud). Moreover, people would start associating the Apple brand with Facebook. If downloaded apps were primarily centered around Facebook friends, Facebook could obtain immense power. If I were Steve Jobs, that possibility would be terrifying.

But should fear of Facebook dominance surpass the invaluable opportunity for Apple to expand?  For entry into arguably the largest social network and amplified exposure of the App Store, I think not. Besides, Apple could obtain an ally in Facebook in crushing Google, a common foe!