Facebook and Snapchat Up Against Each Other

Who knew Snapchat ever pose as a threat to the social media giant; but it is and Facebook needs to be prepared.

Facebook Inc. up till now had no real threat in the market, however, Snapchat with its latest features have signaled the social media giant, that it is here to stay and is not just a play toy anymore. Last month, the social media network bought Masquerade -an app quite identical to the video messaging app, Snapchat and in retaliation the video messaging app bought Bitstrips that gained popularity on Facebook in 2013.

The fact Facebook has been striving to be a leader in the messenger and chat market for a few years now; and the best way to tackle competition in the specific market has been to buy to the competitor. As for Snapchat, before this, the social media giant had not even thought twice about Snapchat – but should it be worried now? Now, that the app has launched features that have been quite prominent on Facebook’s messenger and it is no longer just ‘any other’ app, we believe that the social media website should feel threatened.

Snapchat’s 2.0 upgrade caught Facebook’s eye; the app is now directly a threat to the social media’s messenger. Vanity Fair stated that the upgrade 2.0 lets snapchat users make voice calls, send video and audio messages, and along with that it also allows users to have a private video chat session; users can choose the people they want to talk to and simply starting shooting the video. The upgrade also has over 200 new stickers (as emoticons is the new internet language); these stickers are quite different from the ones that are available on WhatsApp and Facebook messenger however they seem very appealing.

On the contrary, Facebook, in an effort to tackle this new move by the video and photo messaging app, is working on a new feature of the messenger by the name of Secret Conversations. No other details regarding this feature have been made available or announced by the social media site currently however it will interesting to find out what the company has in store for its users now. The name does suggest that the new feature could be something Snapchat’s disappearing ability – maybe the messages might disappear after 10 seconds, who knows!

Vanity Fair is stated that if this new Secret Conversation feature is not something close to Snapchat’s disappearing feature, then this feature could simply mean that the social media network is working on some heavy encryption to keep user’s conversations and chats private.

Yet another concern that the social media website has regarding Snapchat is advertisers. To make money, Facebook has heavily relied on advertisements however now that Snapchat is making an impact, many advertiser might prefer to go towards that app as it will be able to interact with customers in a more social way. Snapchat is providing an alternative to advertisers in place of TV ads however if it wants to go forward with that, it will need to open up to the kind of tracking and targeting that Facebook provides to its advertisers.

However, we do believe that will not be much an issue for Facebook due to its huge customer base; its current billions of users already overshadows Snapchat users all across the world. The company will be working on keeping its user’s attention towards itself which can provide to be a difficult task for the company of that magnitude though not impossible.

Last Month Blackberry Lost WhatsApp, And Now It loses Facebook Inc.

The Canadian smartphone maker got a bit too excited after launching the Priv; however with the discontinuation of Facebook and WhatsApp on the devices, worse times are ahead for the company.

Many believed Blackberry Ltd.’s luck would turn around with the introduction of its android powered smartphone, Priv. However, BB user’s dismay Facebook and its subsidiary, WhatsApp, an instant messaging and voice calling platform is pulling the plug on Blackberry. Earlier this month, WhatsApp announced that it will not make the service available on the smartphone’s made by the Canadian phone-maker and now Facebook, Inc., the social media giant has announced that it won’t be providing support to it either.

WhatsApp announced last month that it will be ending support for Blackberry’s smartphone by the end of 2016, so users have until then to enjoy the service on their BB devices. The team of the instant messaging app stated: even though the BB operating system has done a lot for the platform and has been an important part of their story, it has been unable to offer the kind of capabilities that are required for the company to evolve their apps features.

On the other hand, Blackberry stated in a blog post that they are extremely disappointed in the social media company’s decision as many users were attracted towards their devices because of these apps. Despite the fact that the Canadian smartphone maker even fought back with these two and tried to convince them to change their minds; unfortunately they took firm on their decision.

This move does not work in the favor of the Canadian smartphone manufacturer at all, as now users will not be able to share anything on social media platform with the help of a button. The users will lose the ability to sync their contact with Facebook and will not be able to do numerous other things. To avoid all that hassle they simply won’t purchase the products anymore which would results in a significant decline in the company’s sales.

Many Blackberry users have turned to twitter to voice their views however we believe that people voicing their opinions and disappointment will not make much of a difference anymore. Users have stated that they are saddened by the fact that BB10 Leap users will not be able to use these social platforms on the device anymore and that they will have to turn to other devices such as Samsung Tablets etc. to enjoy the experience.

To tackle this problem, the company has come up with alternative solutions which includes the introduction of a new feature called ‘Great Apps on Blackberry’. This latest feature by the smartphone maker will comprise of 20 best applications that will be featured for 14 days each month; even though this latest addition might seem appealing to app developers, it might not be much of an attraction for the end users. The fact that the users won’t be able to use Facebook and WhatsApp on their smartphone’s anymore is saddening news for BB as it will result in Blackberry losing millions of users.