messaging
WhatsApp Ditches $1 Annual Fee, Tests Business Accounts But No Ads, Says CEO
Today at the DLD conference in Munich, Germany, the CEO of Facebook-owned WhatsApp made a couple of big announcements about how the messaging app plans to evolve to its next phase as…
Tumblr’s Instant Messaging Now Available To All, Adds Support For Sharing Posts
Last month, Tumblr rolled out instant messaging on the web, iOS and Android to a subset of Tumblr users ahead of a broader launch. Today, the company says that all users will…
WeChat Plans To Invest $3.4M In Early-Stage African Startups
China’s largest messaging app will invest 50 million rand (about $3.4 million USD) in African startups. WeChat said in a blog post that will work with Cape Town tech strategy…
Google Wants To Text Message You With Holiday Shopping Deals
A number of startups emerged this year to offer consumers an easier way to shop: instead of immersive, e-commerce experiences, companies like Magic, Operator, Fetch, GoButler, and others, including Facebook, are testing out…
Facebook Messenger Is Experimenting With Disappearing Messages
Facebook Messenger is testing out self-destructing messages. Currently available for some users in France, the feature allows people to send messages that vanish in an hour. BuzzFeed first reported the…
Cola Is Building A Platform To Help You Send Fewer Text Messages
As text messaging takes over more of my communication, I find myself on lots of long and complicated chats where I’m trying to plan and coordinate with multiple people. Now…
Forget Self-Destructing Messages, Buzz’s New App Offers Self-Destructing Connections
Today, there are a variety of apps to choose from if you just want to privately chat with friends or even place phone calls without having to give out your…
Slack Introduces User Groups To Let Larger Teams Collaborate Way More Effectively
A great deal of Slack’s success has come from its ability to allow companies to communicate internally in a fluid and transparent manner. Now the enterprise messaging service is looking…
Apps don’t come much more simple than this: Flyr is an event invite creator for iOS that lets you slap a couple of captions atop an animated GIF so you…
As the number of mobile apps increases while the size of our mobile screens decreases, we’re reaching the limits of the mobile “OS + apps” paradigm. As an alternative, messaging…
Communications Platform Layer Adds Support For Webhooks
Layer, the former TechCrunch Disrupt winner that makes it possible for developers to add rich messaging capabilities to their apps without having to build their own infrastructure, has been steadily…
Formerly Known As Bolt, Charge Messenger Raises $1.7M Seed Round And Launches Web Client
With messaging apps like WhatsApp, Line, and Viber fighting for growth around the world, is there room for smaller, newer players? Charge Messenger thinks so and to prove that point,…
Today’s “invisible app” market could be classified as a passing trend, but it might also be the beginning of a significant multi-year shift in how we transact when we’re away…
Remitly Buys Talio To Boost Its Money Transfer App With Messaging Features
While Facebook moves deeper into using its Messenger platform as a vehicle for people to transfer money to each other, an app built for helping people transfer money is adding…
Line Moves Into Group Calling With Popcorn Buzz, Lets You Talk With Up To 200 People For Free
Line, the messaging upstart out of Japan, is adding group calling into its ever-expanding web of services. Popcorn Buzz, as the app is called, is entering a crowded market for group calling…
Re:quest Offers A Faster Way To Respond To Messages On Apple Watch And iPhone
If you’ve ever gotten stuck messaging friends back and forth just to get the answer to a simple question, a new iPhone and Apple Watch application called Re:quest wants to help.…
BitTorrent’s Encrypted P2P Chat Service Bleep Adds iOS App, ‘Whisper’ Ephemeral Mode
Bleep, an encrypted text, picture and voice chat app built on peer-to-peer architecture by the P2P company BitTorrent, has picked up over 200,000 users on Windows, Android and Mac while…
Encrypted Chat App Wickr Creates New Non-Profit Arm, Nico Sell Steps Down As CEO To Lead It
Some big changes ahead for Wickr, the messaging app that emerged in the wake of the NSA private data leaks to offer consumers an encrypted, more secure alternative to mainstream services like Facebook.…
Mobile-First Word Processing App Quip Adds Chat Rooms, Making It More Like Slack
Products like Slack, Hipchat, Yammer and Asana have been slowly picking apart the world of enterprise communication, giving workers new, easier to use, and frankly more fun platforms to speak…
Caliber Debuts A Messaging App Designed For Business Professionals
A number of startups in years past have tried to carve out their own niche in the business networking space under the looming shadow of LinkedIn by offering an alternative way…
Facebook’s Messenger Platform Preserves WhatsApp’s Clarity Of Purpose
We demystified it last month, but Facebook’s $18 billion acquisition of WhatsApp should begin to make more sense to people today after the company announced that its Messenger service will…
VaporChat Scores $1.5M For Its Private Messaging App That Puts Users In Control Of Their Texts
A startup called VaporChat has raised $1.5 million for its newly launched mobile application which pushes the concept of “ephemeral” messaging further by not only allowing users to un-send text…
Mustbin’s New App Blends Secure Private Messaging With Cloud Storage
Mustbin, the mobile application that began as a secure organizer for personal documents and other information captured by your smartphone’s camera, is today making a larger move to compete in the private…
Layer, Which Lets Developers Add Messaging To Any App, Launches To Public
Layer, the company making it possible for developers to add rich messaging capabilities to their apps without having to build their own infrastructure from the ground up, is today making…
A Year Later, $19 Billion For WhatsApp Doesn’t Sound So Crazy
Messaging is the center of mobile. Snapchat is raising at around a $20 billion valuation. And no one cares who owns apps. On February 19, 2014, we didn’t know any…
ArmorText Raises $2 Million For Its Secure Mobile Messaging Service For Enterprise
A company called ArmorText, which is developing a secure messaging client for the enterprise designed to meet the needs of those in regulated markets, has just raised nearly $2 million in outside…
ScreenPop, Backed By $3.2 Million, Lets You Message Friends From Your Phone’s Lockscreen
Locket, the makers of a mobile application that brings personalized news and other stories to your Android phone’s lockscreen is out today with a new lockscreen-based messaging application called ScreenPop.…
Blinq Enhances Your Favorite Messaging Applications With Extra Information
A new mobile application called Blinq is launching today into public beta to add a layer of contextual information to your favorite mobile messaging applications. Founder Yossi Ghinsberg, who’s better…
Windows 10’s Mobile Debut Reveals Cross-Platform Features And Skype Integration
Windows 10 was hailed at Microsoft’s special event today as a cross-platform OS that makes it easy to build once and ship to almost anything. Microsoft EVP of Operating Systems…
Line Releases A Standalone Sticker App For Discovering New Stickers Because… Stickers
If you think Facebook’s standalone app for adding stickers to your photos is overkill, then the Line Stickers app for iOS and Android is most definitely not for you.
