Is this the future of social shopping? E-commerce giant Amazon.com has launched a new feature that lets people connect their Amazon and Facebook accounts, and get gift recommendations for themselves and their friends based on Facebook profile information.

It's a pretty interesting integration, and a way for Amazon to tap the growing popularity of the top online social network.

Of course, some people may find the whole notion of sharing highly personal Facebook information with Amazon a little creepy. Perhaps for that reason, Amazon emphasizes several privacy protections — saying it will not share people's Amazon account information and purchase history with Facebook, and it will not attempt to contact people's Facebook friends.

The new Amazon Facebook feature also lists your Facebook friends' upcoming birthdays and gives gift suggestions for them, and displays movies, music and other items that are popular among your Facebook friends.

Amazon has been slowly exploring the possibilities of social commerce, the concept of linking social networks with e-commerce. The company has made use of Twitter to highlight deals, and recently acquired daily deal site Woot (which relies on social networks to spread the word on deals).

Does this mean Amazon won't be launching its own Facebook-like social networking system?

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