among many to have hailed their relevance,
in particular, in the workplace. “Chatbots offer
huge potential for employee communication,”
she has observed, adding: “They can take over
the tasks that are needlessly complicated.”
As for which of the current technology giants
are likely to be exercising an especially strong
influence over the onward direction of instant
messaging well into the 2020s, you can bet
that Facebook will figure highly among
them. Earlier this year, CEO Mark Zuckerberg
indicated that private messaging would be
central to the social network’s future amid a
likely move away from the more ‘open’ social
sharing that has characterized the 2010s – and
as Vox writer Kurt Wagner has observed,
Facebook’s ownership of both WhatsApp and
Facebook Messenger leaves the company “well
positioned for this future.”
So... the battle lines have already been drawn
for the instant messaging rivalries of the 2020s.
Will the likes of Facebook and Apple continue
to make their current dominance count, or will
these traditional heavyweights be blindsided
by new, smaller and more agile incomers,
following in the footsteps of other one-time
‘minnows’ like WhatsApp and Snapchat?
Whatever happens, it’ll be absolutely
fascinating to watch it all unfold, and hopefully
emphatically to the benefit of ordinary people
who simply wish to be able to contact each
other quicker and more easily.
by Benjamin Kerry & Gavin Lenaghan