Tech Blog

[#1]

Fine, fine, I’m not a huge fan of Facebook. I know, I know Facebook is a huge force on the Internet and whatever his royal Zuckness does makes news, however I’m just not feeling the vibe with the Facebook Messenger app that launched last week. That doesn’t mean I’m right though. In fact, while I might not dig Facebook Messenger, I bet that in the coming months it will be a big deal. A big deal that phone companies are going to have to deal with. Yeah, I said phone companies and not Google. Here’s why.

It’s about fast and free

You can blame the London Riots for bringing this into focus for me. All the kerfuffle around RIM’s BlackBerry Messenger (BBM) being used to coordinate (allegedly) looting and rioting is a hugely important tech trend. It is being said that in the U.K. BBM is popular because it is free to use, no insanely high bills for sending texts to all your mates. Have BlackBerry, have BBM. BBM means free messaging.

Just like Huddle in Google+, just like iMessage will be in iOS 5, and just like Facebook Messenger is now.

Free, rapid messaging is key to mass adoption and communication. Have a limit on how many texts you can send and receive, but have a decent data plan? Chat with your friends all day with Facebook Messenger for essentially nothing. Phone companies who have been hoping that revenue from SMS fees are going to help their bottom line are in trouble. Of course phone companies who know that data plans are where the money is, are dancing in the streets.

Sure Google and Apple are probably a mite worried about Facebook Messenger. It comes down to who can get the broadest adoption fastest (most regular users, most supported devices) for who will become the de facto messaging app. But let’s talk about Facebook Messenger for a moment.

The app

Facebook Messenger isn’t really a new app in terms of how it works with your Facebook account. You’re not sending a new type of message, rather you’re just sending regular Facebook messages through a dedicated app. The intention, as many suspect, will be that instead of using the regular Facebook app for contacting your friends, that you’ll switch to the Messenger app and that will start to have more features than just messages and pictures. Rumor has it that the app was built with Skype (or just plain old video) in mind from the start.

Right now, however, I think Facebook Messenger is underwhelming, but has the potential to be disruptive in the future if it ramps the feature set up.

If you use Facebook that is.

I’d rather Huddle.

[#2]

Heh, funny guy And yet, I agree - FB may not be the cat's pajamas for a lot of things, but if you do use FB, FB messenger may work for you. But there are other messaging apps to explore too...