News & Reviews:   Facebook Messenger

Yesterday, Facebook Messenger had an update that trimmed the fat of the app in various areas. Now, we have a little more detail as to what was done on the development side. Facebook has revealed that the Messenger app for iOS is now twice as fast and is 84% smaller than the previous version.

Many regular users of Facebook Messenger have run into a chatbot at one point or another and while amusing at times, most find it pointless. Facebook has redesigned the app, which has been greatly streamlined with the Discover tab for businesses now gone. Instead, it now has an emphasis on the People tab and is more focused on Stories.

Apparently, last week Facebook quietly released a rather peculiar app called Whale, which allows the user to create memes via stock photos or various pictures found on your device. Not only that, the user could also easily send the memes that they have made to their friends and families via Instagram or Facebook Messenger as well.

Yesterday, Facebook introduced a unifying payment service that works across Facebook, Messenger, WhatsApp, and Instagram to the public. The payment service called ‘Facebook Pay’ has started to roll out to users in the US after its announcement. It is said that they are working on bringing the service to more countries as well!

Despite the fact that WhatsApp, Instagram and FB Messenger all belong under Facebook, the social media platform has seen a huge decline in its user engagement on their platform compared to the rest. This probably has led to the reason why Facebook is looking to unifi Facebook with WhatsApp, FB Messenger and Instagram.

Are you a fan of Facebook Messenger? It looks like you would soon be able to react to individual messages on the popular app. The feature, which is already available on Facebook’s News Feed, is currently being tested by random users. There’s a total of 5 reaction emoji(s) and another 2 others, which are thumbs up and thumbs down, which meant you could now dislike or disagree to a message. The 5 reaction emoji includes expression of love, funny, shocked, sad, and frown.

While most people uses the Facebook Messenger as a chat service to talk with friends, Facebook thinks that it can be more than just for words. They have now rolled out an update for Android and iOS that will allow users to play a number of classic and current games directly in Messenger.