Twitter outrage as WhatsApp gone down for hours days after Facebook purchase

By: Dion Dassanayake

twitter users first posted their frustration around 7pm this evening after opening the messaging service and seeing it fail to connect to servers.

Two days ago the app available for Apple iPhones, Blackberrys and Android devices was bought by Facebook for $19 billion (£11.4bn).

WhatsApp took to Twitter around 8.15pm to confirm that the service is experiencing problems and they are working to fix the issues.It is not clear if the problem is localised to certain regions or if it is affecting users worldwide.
the WhatsApp Status account tweeted: "Sorry we currently experiencing server issues. we hope to be back up and recovered shortly."

Tech website BGR India reported that a WhatsApp spokesperson they spoke to did not give them a timeframe for how long it would take to fix the hitch.

WhatsApp users came in droves to Twitter to tweet about not being able to access the service with many joking about how soon it came after the Facebook acquisition.

Twitter user The Craft posted: "Facebook buys WhatsApp. WhatsApp stops working. FAB."

Sophie Thompson tweeted: "Its like Facebook bought Whatsapp and purposely stopped it from working so everyone would resort back to group messages on Facebook instead".

Tweeter Liat added: "Facebook is in a relationship with WhatsApp and it's complicated".
On Thursday Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg hailed the acquisition of WhatsApp and said the service was on track for one billion users worldwide.
Speaking about WhatsApp, Mr Zuckerberg said: "No one in the history of the world has ever done something like this."

Facebook Flip-Flops on Messenger After WhatsApp Acquisition

by kurt wagner

it was just four months ago that Facebook updated its standalone messaging app, Messenger, with the goal of making the user experience more like texting.

That task appears to be easier said than done. Facebook's $19 billion acquisition of messaging app WhatsApp on Wednesday effectively confirmed that Messenger didn't live up to the task, at least not outside the U.S.

With the acquisition, Facebook has started preaching a very different strategy for Messenger than was outlined just four months ago.

With the Messenger update in October, Facebook opened messaging to all its users' mobile contacts, not just those on Messenger. Users needed only to add their phone numbers within the app. Messenger was redesigned to look like a standard text message inbox, and messages were delivered more quickly than before, according to Facebook product managers.

The app even had icons to alert users if they were sending a message to someone on mobile instead of their Facebook inbox. The update, in short, was intended to produce a real rival to SMS — not to mention WhatsApp.

"All of our changes around the new Messenger are about making it a mobile-to-mobile experience, so that I know I can dependably reach you instantly," Peter Martinazzi, Messenger product manager at Facebook, told Mashable last October. "If you're on Messenger, its going to go to your phone and you're going to treat it just like you would SMS, as a high priority mobile to mobile message."

Fast forward to Wednesday, when Mark Zuckerberg discussed WhatsApp with investors and mentioned Messenger frequently. Gone was the comparison to SMS. Messenger was suddenly an app for casual conversations between Facebook friends.

Messenger "evolved from Facebook chat, which was more instant messaging, not SMS," said Zuckerberg. "It's widely used today for chatting with your Facebook friends, and a lot of the messages people send are not real-time. Someone will send someone a message like a more informal email and then expect a reply later in the day."

So what happened? Facebook simply bought a better way to capture the global messaging audience, which WhatsApp reaches. In the 10 days leading up to Wednesday's acquisition, WhatsApp was the top social networking app on iOS every day but one in the United Kingdom, Germany, and Italy, according to App Annie.

"Facebook tends to be floppy," says Gartner analyst Brian Blau. "They try one thing, it doesn't work out, then they immediately try something else. It's how Facebook tries to innovate."

It would be hard to see Messenger disappearing anytime soon, Blau added. It seems likely that Facebook was simply hedging its bets — building an app to compete with WhatsApp while simultaneously pursuing it.

Regardless of the reason, it appears that Messenger has been relegated back to its original use case — casual conversations between Facebook friends. Because if you can't beat 'em, buy 'em.

Will WhatsApp Reach 1 Billion Users Faster Than Facebook Did?

by kurt wagner

it appears that the billion-user club is about to get a new member.

Facebook announced the acquisition of messaging app WhatsApp on Wednesday, a deal worth up to $19 billion in cash and stock that puts serious muscle behind Facebook's international reach.

In a call with investors to outline the acquisition, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and WhatsApp CEO Jan Koum hinted multiple times that they expect WhatsApp to become a billion-user platform, a milestone that Facebook eclipsed less than 18 months ago.

"WhatsApp is the only widely used app we've ever seen that has more engagement and a higher percent of people using it daily than Facebook itself," Zuckerberg said on the acquisition call Wednesday, noting that WhatsApp has doubled in size over the past year. "Based on our experience of building global services with strong growth and engagement, we believe WhatsApp is on a path to reach over one billion people in the next few years."

WhatsApp has already over 450 million monthly active users (320 of which are daily active users), and the company claims it is adding more than one million new users per day. For comparison purposes, Twitter added nine million new users in the entire Q4 2013; Facebook did better, adding 40 million in the same three month period, but growth is slower for a company with a billion-plus users already under its belt.

Facebook reached one billion in October 2012, roughly eight and a half years after launch. Could WhatsApp hit one billion even faster?

Assuming the company continues to add one million users per day, then yes. Much faster, actually.

WhatsApp is on pace to reach one billion users in August of 2015, approximately a year and a half after being acquired by Facebook. At that time, WhatsApp will be a little more than 6 years old, achieving the billion user milestone more than two years faster than Facebook did.

Of course, WhatsApp's trajectory is likely to change over time. Just like other consumer services like Facebook and Twitter, growth may slow as the user base gets larger and new users are harder to find.

Regardless of the timing, Zuckerberg seems poised to own two separate billion-user brands in the near future, and he's understandably excited.

"Services in the world that have a billion people using them are incredibly valuable," he said.

For $19 billion, we'd certainly hope so.

Twitter Buys Bagcheck for Engineering Talent

by Jennifer Van Grove

Twitter has purchased lists and interests-focused startup Bagcheck for an undisclosed sum, co-founders Sam Pullara and Luke Wroblewski revealed in announcements Monday.

Bagcheck, launched just seven months ago, encourages members to build collections of products, applications and items they love by placing them into “bags.”

“We’ve acquired Bagcheck, and Sam Pullara, its co-founder and CTO will join us today,” a Twitter spokesperson tells Mashable.

The acquisition of Bagcheck appears to be mostly motivated by a decision to snatch up the engineering half of the two-man co-founder team. Pullara is joining Twitter’s engineering team, but Wroblewski is said to be working on the “next big thing.”

“Sam Pullara is a rare talent with a deep appreciation for connecting people with their interests,” Twitter’s representative says. “He’s a skilled product strategist, technologist and entrepreneur who has not only led large teams at Yahoo and Borland, but has co-founded successful ventures and spent time advising young startups as an Entrepreneur in Residence at Accel Venture Partners and Benchmark Capital.”

One of Bagcheck’s crowning achievements, says Wroblewski, was rolling out a number of real-time user interface elements. These elements — such as real-time notifications and an as-it-happens view of who’s checking out your “bag” — perhaps speak to Twitter’s real interest in the young company.

The Bagcheck site will continue to be available for the immediate future, Pullara says. “But as with any acquisition, things may change at some point in the future,” he adds.

“It’s too soon at this point to share any details on how and whether Bagcheck will be incorporated into Twitter,” Twitter’s spokesperson says.

AOL Acquires Huffington Post for $315 Million

by Ben Parr

AOL has acquired The Huffington Post for $315 million in its biggest move since it became an independent company in 2009.

The acquisition will create a new online media conglomerate that already owns news websites TechCrunch and Engadget. According to The New York Times, the deal is worth $300 million in cash with $15 million in stock.

As part of the deal, The Huffington Post co-founder Arianna Huffington will be appointed president editor-in-chief of all of AOL’s content. She will not only run The Huffington Post, but will lead AOL’s news, tech, women, local, multicultural, entertainment video and community content businesses in an AOL entity that will be known as the Huffington Post Media Group.

The Huffington Post Media Group will also be in charge of MapQuest, AOL Music, AutoBlog, Patch, Engadgetand TechCrunch. Huffington Post CEO Eric Hippeau and Chief Revenue Officer Greg Coleman will be leavingThe Huffington Post, according to AllThingsD.

“By combining HuffPost with AOL’s network of sites, thriving video initiative, local focus, and international reach, we know we’ll be creating a company that can have an enormous impact, reaching a global audience on every imaginable platform,” Arianna Huffington said moments ago in a blog post announcing the acquisition.

AOL now claims that the combined entity reaches 117 million unique visitors per month in the U.S. and 270 million worldwide. AOL CEO Tim Armstrong says the new organization will be “a next-generation American media company” focused on content, community and social experiences.