Instant messengers are making quite a buzz these days,
especially after one IM app was sold to Facebook for $16 billion. Today, three
apps have received updates that give them more functionality to better compete
with other apps in the rapidly growing and competitive IM arena.
FACEBOOK MESSENGER FOR ANDROID
Aside from its recently purchased WhatsApp, the social
networking giant also has its own instant messaging for smartphones. This week,
the company release version 4.0 of Facebook Messenger for Android that now
allows users to create specific groups from their contacts and store them in a
dedicated tab within the app.
Moreover, the app will let users pin the group into their
Android home screen (represented by a floating chat head), giving them quick
access whenever they need to send message to members of the group.
SAMSUNG CHATON
Samsung has also given new features to its ChatOn instant
messaging app. After the update, users will be able to transfer media up to 1GB
and show their location on Foursquare via Glympse.
The app will also be able to recall instant messages even if
the recipient has already read the message. This should allow users to correct
messages that were sent prematurely or those that were sent in error to the
wrong person. However, this feature will only work with one-to-one chats and
not on group chats.
VINE VIDEOS
Lastly, we have Instagram’s Vine Video clip app which
received an update that now lets users send instant messages or videos to their
contacts whether or not they have the app installed on their devices.
The app’s closes competitor – Instagram has had the feature
since December of last year.
