You probably have Facebook installed on your smartphone, with it being the biggest social media network and all, but you also probably have Messenger installed especially if you use the platform to text and keep in touch with your friends. It’s a little bit of an annoyance to have to keep switching between Messenger and Facebook, which is perhaps why Meta is announcing that they’re finally reuniting the two apps.
In case you didn’t know, you used to be able to message others on Facebook directly on the smartphone app up until some time in 2014, when Mark Zuckerberg decided that splitting the two would allow for a better user experience. Now though, Meta is looking at allowing people to use Messenger from within the Facebook app again, with the same reason of ‘delivering the best experience to people’.
It appears as though this change was brought about after Meta realised that people didn’t like having to switch to another app to share what they discover on Facebook (big surprise there guys). Specifically, they cite user behaviour on Instagram, with Instagram users resharing the Reels they watch on the app with others through DMs nearly a billion times a day.
“Over the coming year, we’ll build more ways to integrate messaging features in Facebook. Ultimately, we want it to be easy and convenient for people to connect and share, whether in the Messenger app or directly within Facebook.
On top of that, Meta also mentioned that the community chats feature that they had introduced to Facebook Groups late last year has been well received. They say that across Facebook and Messenger, the number of people trying out the community chats feature has increased by 50% in December of last year,” – Tom Alison, Head of Facebook at Meta
Meta also took the time in the same blog post on their site to mention that, ‘contrary to reports otherwise’, Facebook isn’t dead nor is it dying. In fact, they say that they are thriving with two billion daily active users. As part of their plan then to keep these users, Meta is investing into AI-powered discovery tools for their platform, with Reels in particular a big focus. This is likely their way of trying to take on TikTok, the big leader in using algorithms to help users watch short form videos that they personally would find interesting, one after another.
