Worlds Collide! Facebook Announces Plan to Merge WhatsApp, Instagram, and Messenger Text Services

In a bid to take over all of your messaging across related platforms, Facebook is planning on merging the text applications found in its popular Instagram, WhatsApp, and Messenger services according to the UK’s The Independent.

Image via Anton from Pexels.com.

Each brand will maintain its functionality and identity but it sounds like the underlying messaging architecture used for text and chat will be unified among them.

A spokesperson for Facebook told the Independent, “We’re working on making more of our messaging products end-to-end encrypted and considering ways to make it easier to reach friends and family across networks.”

That would be a huge change for Facebook which has done a masterful job of managing each app on its own. Bringing them together for this one functionality certainly has benefits that even a layperson can immediately identify, but who knows if users are going to accept it.

As far as for when these changes could be implemented a report in the New York Times says that the merger will take place in 2020.

Those that have long memories will recall that Facebook spent a ton of money acquiring Instagram and WhatsApp. And the two divisions have proven a success for Facebook though merging them with the mother ship does somewhat cancel CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s promise to keep everything independent.

Even so, as the Independent points out, all of the founders of Instagram and WhatsApp have since left the company. The UK publication also alleges that a meeting between WhatsApp’s founders and staff in which they argued against merging messaging platforms.

While they are all owned by Facebook, Instagram, Messenger, and WhatsApp have vastly different communities – as well as standards for membership. WhatsApp only requires the very minimum of personal identification to sign up for its service, for example.

What do you think? Will merging these messaging services help or hurt? Let us know in the comments.

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