Whatsapp: Digital Genre Profile

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It seems that the best features available to iPhone consumers were first introduced on the platform of WhatsApp. It wasn’t the first or the second generation of the iPhone operation system, or OS for short, that differentiated texting between Apple and other products. Now one of the privileges for iPhone users is assurance that their texts won’t be divided in parts and delivered out of sequence, which is common for Android texts. All of this was at hand for WhatsApp users pretty much from the get-go.

The main difference between Facebook messenger and WhatsApp is that the former is used between people who are usually friends on Facebook while the latter doesn’t require a profile in any social network. It is especially useful in countries that do not allow Facebook, like China, or have their own popular versions of Facebook, like VKontakte in Russia, and creating a profile in yet another social network seems to be excessive and unnecessary. However, ever since Facebook acquired WhatsApp in 2014, there are a lot similarities between the two messengers. A video camera icon and a phone receiver icon look the same and are located at the top upper corner of the Facebook messenger, as they are for WhatsApp. Their interface is the same. The major advantage of WhatsApp over Facebook messenger is that even though it is not required to be friends on Facebook to exchange messages, the user’s profile is connected to their Facebook account, and that opens a door for cyberstalking. The only piece of personal information that is shared on WhatsApp is a phone number and a profile picture, if a user set up one. With some of the high-profile incidents that have occurred on Twitter, Facebook, and other platforms, this is a definite benefit for many.

One of the favorite options on WhatsApp is group messaging. School alumni, family members and scientists exchange their news, ideas and innovations all across the globe. Even the cast of Harry Potter has gotten in on the act. According to Emma Watson, the cast still keeps in touch by WhatsApp group messaging.

It has been reported that using WhatsApp damaged telecommunication companies profits by billions of dollars, based on lost SMS fees. For example, by 2012, WhatsApp supported billions of messages around the globe. By February of 2017, the service boasted a user base of over 1.2 billion. Clearly, the benefits of WhatsApp are obvious to a massive percentage of the world’s population. In an increasingly globalized and interconnected world, WhatsApp serves an incredible need that is sure to persist for many decades to come.