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Messenger API Updates for Europe

developers.facebook.com

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Re: Messenger API Updates for Europe

#41
post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Telegram, I think Signal, too. There are alternatives, they're just not as popular now.

Do telcos in US/Europe create the same incumbency that telcos in Latin America create? Here in Mexico, any mobile data package comes with free data for blessed services like Whatsapp and FB Messenger. Obviously trying to compete with each other on these perks. Using a competitor like Telegram is a complete nonstarter when trading memes or video chat eats into your data. The cheapest plan from Telcel (pay-as-you-go +…

They do the same thing here, yes.

But if the EU decides to legislate against FB, for example, I doubt they'll be that silly, they'll probably shoot these clauses down.

Re: Messenger API Updates for Europe

#42
post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While come January the UK won't be part of the EEA, at least initially GDPR will continue to apply as most EU law has been grandfathered into UK law post-transition.

Yes, but as far as I'm aware the question of whether the UK will be a "third country" for purposes of data transfer outside the EU after January 1 is still undecided? (Where is Facebook's data center anyway, is it Ireland?)

Forest City, North Carolina; Altoona, Iowa; Fort Worth, Texas; Los Lunas, New Mexico; Clonee, Ireland; Lulea, Sweden; and Odense, Denmark

Re: Messenger API Updates for Europe

#43
post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Telegram, I think Signal, too. There are alternatives, they're just not as popular now.

Do telcos in US/Europe create the same incumbency that telcos in Latin America create? Here in Mexico, any mobile data package comes with free data for blessed services like Whatsapp and FB Messenger. Obviously trying to compete with each other on these perks. Using a competitor like Telegram is a complete nonstarter when trading memes or video chat eats into your data. The cheapest plan from Telcel (pay-as-you-go +…

In Sweden they do not do that for messenger clients but they do it for video streaming sites. Data is so cheap here that a messenger would not be a good selling point.

It is probably illegal (on the paper we have net neutrality, the telcos just blatantly break the law) to do so in Sweden which why some telcos are in a legal battle with our regulatory authority.

Re: Messenger API Updates for Europe

#44
post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Telegram, I think Signal, too. There are alternatives, they're just not as popular now.

Telegram may be getting momentum, but it’s nothing near the usage of WhatsApp over here. Signal nobody knows anything about, there’s nobody on there.

I think this is very local. Here in Sweden I have only ever met one person who used Whatsapp. I feel most people use Facebook messenger with some use of Skype, Google Hangouts, Telegram, Signal and Slack.

Re: Messenger API Updates for Europe

#45
post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Telegram may be getting momentum, but it’s nothing near the usage of WhatsApp over here. Signal nobody knows anything about, there’s nobody on there.

I think this is very local. Here in Sweden I have only ever met one person who used Whatsapp. I feel most people use Facebook messenger with some use of Skype, Google Hangouts, Telegram, Signal and Slack.

In at least France, Romania, Luxembourg, Italy, Germany, WhatsApp is very popular.

By popular I mean "small businesses start advertising contacting them through WhatsApp"-popular.

It would be nice to have a breakdown of these numbers but we'll probably never get them from FB.

Re: Messenger API Updates for Europe

#46
post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To honest, I think this is probably the begining of the end for Facebook. I foresee that they'll be forced to reduce services in Europe repeatedly. It'll be interesting to see what takes its place.

I don’t see FB shutting down a service like Watsapp in Europe in the next decade at least, first of all because countless European politicians use it, to say nothing of the hundreds of millions of Europeans who use it regularly. There’s nothing else comparable that can take its place.

Is WhatsApps a money generator for Facebook? I would have thought it was just a service they bought to stop someone else buying it.

Re: Messenger API Updates for Europe

#47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To honest, I think this is probably the begining of the end for Facebook. I foresee that they'll be forced to reduce services in Europe repeatedly. It'll be interesting to see what takes its place.

they'll end up preying on the people in 3rd world countries that don't have strong privacy legislation. Same way as Phillip Morris did with cigarettes...

Good luck for them in competing with somebody that has the network effect of being available everywhere.

Re: Messenger API Updates for Europe

#48
It seems like some of these features were loading images directly from the client. So presumably this could have been used to get info like your browser and IP as your phone made the request to the server that they provided.

The recommended work around to to just send the link which now makes it explicit to the user that they are connecting to the third party.

Re: Messenger API Updates for Europe

#49
post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t see FB shutting down a service like Watsapp in Europe in the next decade at least, first of all because countless European politicians use it, to say nothing of the hundreds of millions of Europeans who use it regularly. There’s nothing else comparable that can take its place.

Is WhatsApps a money generator for Facebook? I would have thought it was just a service they bought to stop someone else buying it.

Not yet, they are obviously moving into merging WhatsApp with Messenger/Instagram Direct, but it looks like these recent actions against FB (US Congress questioning monopolistic practices, FB having promises it would not merge WhatsApp with FB Messenger at the time of acquisition, and various privacy investigations from EU countries) are making FB go very very slow on this.

Therefore, so far FB only collects contacts and improves its social network (in the technical sense) with WhatsApp.

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