It is Facebook versus WhatsApp

Why mobile users prefer the SMS-like app to the social media site

A few days back, I attended a conference where a reporter I knew faced the toughest test ever—coming across someone you might know but do not recognise. “Of course I know you,” he responded to a person. To take the joke ahead, I challenged him to guess the last name of the stranger-friend. He guessed it, right.

“I just know his name from Facebook and that he is probably a reporter. But I do not know who he is, where he works. Just looked familiar, that's it,” he sheepishly. With 1.5 billion users, Facebook is a disconnector at many levels, both socially and personally.

Social impact aside, the young mobile-using public does not see Facebook as a must have on their phones. The wrong assumption led to many unsold and unused handsets with Facebook buttons, by manufacturers. Not to mention free-Facebook-for-few-months offers by telecom operators, to try and get more subscribers to use data services.

I would rather give the data-puller tag to WhatsApp. There are many reasons why this SMS-like app is more necessary to mobile users, than social networking. For one, it involves instant texting options in a day and age where not responding to a text is considered being rude. The second being that with since Whatsapp syncs phone contacts, it is very unlikely than an unknown person might be reaching you. The third and the most obvious is that allows endless chatting at a low-unit cost in times where SMSing has become expensive.

But why will Whatsapp threaten Facebook? Whatsapp also allows small social groups to be formed where a bunch of friends can stay in touch and converse with all of them at the same time. They can also upload pictures and share videos and get more instant reactions. Whatsapp also compresses its data shared, making it much easy to upload with less-than-perfect Internet connections.

Users of mobile apps can share more private thoughts in these groups, especially after Facebook posts have become liable to scrutiny-both legal and moral. As fewer 'comfortable' groups get closed on an instant messaging platform, a large canvas like Facebook faces the threat of losing relevance.

I believe Facebook sees and perceives this threat too. It is aggressively pushing its messenger app where chatting is possible with Facebook contacts, apart from sharing and posting. Why is the largest social networking site, meant to reach the entire world focusing on personal communication? Has it realised the importance? Or has its dream of getting the entire world together, ended?

Or did social networkers have have the epiphany of “No friends or enemies if you have never met them”. Man is a social being, with a constant need to belong somewhere. They might as well belong to groups where they are known and recognised, literally.

Facebook will not be directly hit, as few would delete their accounts just because they can post and send pictures on Whatsapp or other mobile communication apps. However, the level activity would go down. And, there would be fewer writings on the Wall.