That WhatsApp acquisition ($19 billion) must have been made exactly because Facebook was thinking that WhatsApp really could have been their Facebook (for Google), their Google (for Microsoft) and their Microsoft (for IBM).
If a messenger could overcome FB, snapchat might actually have a chance, but the key value proposition that FB offers is that it's your online persona. You have pictures up from all the years you been around, you have your friends' profiles to go check out at will, you can start a group, or make an event and know all your friends are already on Facebook to see it.
So why buy? Messengers have the highest retention rate. You can see them expanding upon it by integrating FB profile + allowing you to install "apps" or "plugins" that do X/Y/Z. There is a Chinese company, WeChat, that has made billions on this model. I'm sure FB would like to as well, but with it integrated with FB login etc..
Downvoters: Genuinely curious how I'm wrong if you feel like throwing in your 2 cents.
> You have pictures up from all the years you been around,
In practice, people care very little about this - they want the world to know they were in the Taj Mahal last Sunday or their baby started walking yesterday, but older pictures are generally forgotten, and sometimes even a nuisance for various reasons.
> you have your friends' profiles to go check out at will,
and yet almost never do
> you can start a group,
as you can on WhatsApp
> or make an event and know all your friends are already on Facebook to see it.
This is one use case that is indeed better on Fb, though just posting and gathering replies on WhatsApp seems to suffice in 80% of cases.
(Btw, I'm not among the downvoters.)
I was confused about downvotes because I was at -2 for awhile (maybe I offended snapchat employees ;), but I appreciate you rebutting me. I do believe if there was to be a huge contender to Facebook, it would need a messaging component to grow out of. However, I still do not believe FB made the purchase primarily out of fear of competitive threat. I think FB Integration in a tencent model can make them more money than FB ads (while driving more targeted FB ads).