A Facebook desktop application has long-been rumored, and now it’s here. Without much fanfare at all, you can now keep tabs on your notifications, friend requests, ticker, and chat all without opening your browser.
TechIT and The Verge originally revealed the available download, which you can access here.
There’s been speculation as to when Facebook would offer such an application, and what it would do, and it appears that it’s about as basic as it gets. Messenger for Windows basically brings the right-hand side of your Facebook home page to your desktop. Of course it does have a few implications, namely the death of competitor messaging systems. The likes of AIM and Yahoo Messenger have been struggling to compete with integrated offerings from social platforms, and Facebooks Messenger app has been a major threat to market veterans.
The one feature we wish were available would be the viewing and commenting controls that you have when you’re visiting Facebook in-browser. Via Messenger, the ticker won’t actually reveal the items it’s announcing: instead, you’re redirected to the site. Included items like listening in with friends or viewing pictures via the desktop app would be a huge improvement.
But as far as its utilitarian purposes goes, Messenger does well. And it’s also got us waiting for a more fully-fledged desktop Facebook experience.
its sounds all good, but are people going to go for it. i think it will be a good and handy tool to have, after all we are living in modern times now and things are just going to more out there and unusal.
Luis Nok Outumuro hah, my ICQ is 7 digits! We are showing our age man. haha
I have, several versions over the years. Also Meebo, Miranda and others. But I always go back to Trillian. Also Trillian has iOS and Android versions, which I like so I can keep my unified messaging consistent across multiple platforms.
I been at this a while, my ICQ UID is only 6 digits. :P
Luis Nok Outumuro Have you tried Pidgin? A lot of people at our office use it.
The announcement disappoints… please, not another IM. I dumped all IM clients for Trillian Pro, a multi-IM client (which works great).
Checked out the messenger, but trust me it’s nothing out of the box. I’ll wait for the official release. Hope it doesn’t disappoint.
More info here: https://www.facebook.com/help/messenger-for-windows
It is not available for Mac at this time. According to Facebook, it’s only for Windows 7 currently and might make it to the Mac if the Windows version is popular.
yes that’s what i wanted to ask, is there a mac version?
The download is for a PC, but is there a mac version?