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Facebook, Skype, and video chat: Where does that leave Messenger?

Jul 6, 2011 12:21 pm by Kip Kniskern | 15 comments

Today, Facebook and Skype announced Facebook Video Calling, basically a “mini Skype client” running within Facebook, allowing you to video chat one on one with any of your Facebook friends. Our friend Rafael Rivera, already digging through the FB video chat packets, has found a reference to the code name “Omaha”, and it seems a fitting moniker for what may very well turn out to be a beach head in an aggressive campaign for Facebook to become the defacto communications infrastructure in the world to be. Mark Zuckerberg, at the beginning of the announcement, revealed that Facebook has turned a corner from connecting the world to now building on top of that connected platform, with many new announcements to come in the months to come.

We won’t go through all the details of Facebook Video Calling, except to say that this may not only be a game changer for Microsoft and Windows Live Messenger, but possibly a major reason why Microsoft is paying $8.5 billion for Skype. Facebook Video Calling (along with Facebook Chat and Facebook Group Chat) are going to be serious competitors to Windows Live Messenger, and without the acquisition Microsoft might well be scrambling about now. Indeed, even with Skype in the same company, this upcoming messaging sea change has to be leaving Windows Live Messenger with some important decisions to face. Not only Facebook, but now Google with Google+ are changing the messaging game before our very eyes. Can Messenger keep up?

That’s not to say that Messenger is doomed, as having a native client available for chat without having to keep a browser window open seems to be a major advantage, and Messenger already has Facebook chat integration built in, functioning as an unofficial offline Facebook chat client. But what if Facebook comes out with a client of their own? Zuckerberg said that the three biggest movers for Facebook are apps, mobile, and chat. You can expect Facebook to be very aggressive in pushing all three facets of their platform, with Microsoft and Windows Live as partners, yes, but also as serious competitors.

What will the next few months and years look like for Messenger? Does Messenger still have a place in your online life? What changes does it need to stay relevant? Will messaging in the future just mean connecting up through Facebook (or Google+)? Lots of questions for which there don’t seem to be quick answers, but this will be a very interesting time for Messenger.

This entry was posted in Featured, Opinion and tagged Facebook, Facebook Chat, Messenger, Skype. Bookmark the permalink.

http://doctorwhofan98.wordpress.com/ doctorwhofan98
I use Messenger 2011 all the time. It’s way better than Facebook’s web chat interface. By the way, there’s an update coming up for WL Essentials (it includes SSL support for WL Mail!):
http://windowsteamblog.com/windows_live/b/windowslive/archive/2011/07/06/coming-this-week-an-update-to-windows-live-essentials-2011.aspx
- Mario Albertico
  Same here. Although FB’s web chat interface has been improved drastically over the past couple of months, I never have had a conversation longer than 2 IMs since WLM implemented Facebook.
  - http://doctorwhofan98.wordpress.com/ doctorwhofan98
    The new web interface released today is quite good though, for Facebook…
    Subject: [liveside] Re: Facebook, Skype, and video chat: Where does that leave Messenger?
Anonymous
I’d use Messenger more often but I’m staying with digsby because it features Twitter (yes, I know it’s coming) but it also checks email on lots of different accounts. I wish Messenger could do this plus add AIM contacts because I have way too many friends stuck in the 1990′s. Finally, Messenger needs to let me access yahoo contacts on the various forms of Messenger, such as on Xbox Live and on the web. I have a feeling that my contacts have been online at Yahoo but I haven’t been able to see them if I wasn’t right on the Messenger client.
Mario Albertico
It would be safe to say that both Skype and Facebook would have liked a deal like this to take place, so I wonder to what extent Facebook was made aware of a possible Microsoft acquisition, and to what degree, if they knew, could they have had an effect on the Facebook/Skype deal. In other words, if Facebook was given a hint that Microsoft was very interested in purchasing Skype, then it is very likely that Facebook did not mind working with Microsoft on yet another level.
- http://www.LiveSide.net Kip Kniskern – LiveSide.net
  Yes, interesting to hear Skype CEO Tony Bates say this morning that the first thing he and Steve Ballmer did after making the announcement about the Skype acquisition was to visit Mark Zuckerberg. Kind of hard to believe that it was the first time Zuckerberg heard about the aquisition, or that Ballmer wasn’t aware of the Facebook/Skype partnership (not that anyone’s saying this is the case).
  - Mario Albertico
    Hmm, very interesting indeed… It is the competition’s perfect storm…
Anonymous
This is a promise. I hope Microsoft is hearing me loud and clear. If they decide to pull Windows Live Messenger, I will be closing all my services with Microsoft. That includes email, calendar, pictures, documents, and everything else that I have used Microsoft for years with. I do not care for Google, but that is where I will end up. I did not stick around all these years to see Microsoft finally adavnce with services that everyone can use and rely on to all of a sudden scrabble and throw away. I have already gotten an android phone because they kept being messy with Windows Phones. With the Mango update, if all goes well..I will return.
- Jeremys77
  I’m sure you will be sorely missed.
Rdc520
If there was full interoperability between IM clients, IM could become the defacto messaging system everywhere…on your PC, on the web, and on your phone. Charging for text messaging is redundant when text messaging does nothing that IM doesn’t do (in fact, IM does more) and is available on every feature and smartphone. Since MS owns a portion of FB already, WL Messenger should’ve replaced FB chat and Skype should’ve been integrated with WL Messenger. Why do I need so many applications that all serve the same basic function?
Swanny
Messenger’s simply heading the way of Myspace IMO. I only use it nowadays to talk to FB friends, simply because I like having chat outside of my browser tabs. FB chat integration definitely breathed some extra life into it, but apart from that, everybody’s leaving it. And with the world going more and more for mobile devices and cloud computing, there’s not going to be much more room for it.
WLM 2012 should focus more on being a social hub cross IM client. Keep the FB chat integration, add group chat and video calling. Make it less cartoony and give it the metro look W8 is going for. That’ll give it a couple of extra years.
http://www.seriousinternets.com Tim Smith
I went from having dozens of friends on messenger years ago to literally one person who uses it and now that he’s on facebook we IM through there. With messenger/facebook chat built into Mango messaging I really don’t care which it’s coming through it’s all the same to me at the end of the day. Depending on how the relationship goes in the future I can see Microsoft combining all of their messenger services into one and “powering” facebooks chat while still allowing one unified chat service.
http://www.technokyle.com Kyle
Because their Windows Phone 7 heavily uses facebook so they’re strengthening the relationship which is beneficial for both companies.
Anonymous
If MS is able to postion Windows Live Messenger as the one sollution for chat/videocall on every other im sollution, then its happy days for MS.
So connect WLM to:
FB
Skype
Yahoo
Googletalk
AIM
Do I dare to say, Whatsapp, KIK, etc
markiz
for someone who claims chat is one of their most important fronts, their chat pop-up “client” is ridiculously awful. seriously, it’s so bad, when i receive a chat, if my msn is not turned on, i start it and wait for it to load and than i respond.
i don’t expect more from the video thingy either. Not that i care about video calling anyway.