In 2009 the world was slowly moving towards smart phones and Apple phones where launched shortly before that. Mobile apps were also getting popular with smart phones. Brian Acton applied for a job at Face book but was rejected. So he along with his friend Jan Koum wanted to get into the market of social media and came up with WhatsApp. Originally it was meant to just update the status of people using it more or less like face book.
But then they introduced private message service and this made the WhatsApp popular as we see it now. Now people need not use the SMS services and could connect with anyone around the world in a better way without paying anything. The founders of the company started WhatsApp with funding from some investors of Yahoo where they worked before starting WhatsApp. But as it was a free service so it was not making money but surviving on the initial funding.
These free services can make money in three ways- in app purchases for certain additional services, advertising on the platform and selling the data of users. The founders were against these three things. But as it became more popular with more user base it needed bigger servers and technical manpower to keep up with the growth. In 2010 they introduced a fee of 1 dollar to use WhatsApp though it was not strictly enforced around the world. 1 dollar being a small amount so this strategy worked well and many voluntarily paid it, which sustained the company for some time though it did not make much profit for them.
So they needed investors again. But now WhatsApp with ever increasing popularity, investors came on their own and accepted the clause that they will not interfere in the model of running the business. This was 2011. So their plan was make it the best app which will get more user base and hence more investors. They expected that this cycle would continue. The relied on the network effect where people were using a great service without seeing any unnecessary ads or making any purchases therefore spreading the news about benefit of this app and getting more users.
Then in 2014, face book bought WhatsApp, a company not making any meaningful profit, for 19 billion dollars. At that time no one understood why face book was paying such an unheard of amount to buy WhatsApp. To understand this we know that before WhatsApp face book bought Instagram for 1 billion dollars only. Now face book is notorious for selling data, privacy invasion and targeted ads which the founders of WhatsApp were dead against – but the amount was too much to let go. Also face book did not want any rival company to buy WhatsApp. This was they became the world’s biggest and most connected business around the world with no other company even nearby. ( Moral of the deal- money can overshadow principles)
In 2016 WhatsApp removed the 1 dollar fee which was otherwise not strictly enforced also. So now basically they did not have any external source of income. Face book now had the data of almost about a billion people which helped face book to get a clearer picture of who you are, what is your habit and personal preferences and liking disliking. These data helped face book to better focus on your targeted ads. Trust me; face book knows a lot about you than what you think.
In 2017 Brian Acton left WhatsApp because of what WhatsApp was doing under Face book. Now he made the Signal app as a rival to WhatsApp but it is difficult to make inroads into the market considering the outreach WhatsApp has gained.
In 2021 WhatsApp updated their policy which everyone had to accept to use the service but it had serious privacy issues. After a lot of hue and cry face book decided to postpone the new policy update. Though it is not that face book would be stopping gathering your data but they just stated what data they access – name, IP address, your location, mobile company, status, contact list etc.
Now WhatsApp is so prevalent that people are ready to compromise their privacy to have access to social media and contacts. A normal person is not much bothered about his privacy and by surrendering some privacy he is getting access to the world of social media at his finger tips. A surrender of privacy for getting something free.
As if Facebook can ever be trusted or believed by anyone with any sense.
the only way to use whatsapp,
if circumstances absolutely require,
is on a phone you can discard or wipe.
Using it on anything that has any kind of personal data
is just begging for trouble with sharp edges and nastiness.
The WA software can be used to hack your system
to spy on your keyboard and anything in memory.
@ustralien cops are already looking for hacks to plant evidence
into targeted WA dialogues.
Certain other countries already monitor WA feeds
to hunt down blasphemers
and other people who do not comply with norms.
WA End-to-End Encryption uses keys they generate for you.
WA is pure evil,
unless you already own nothing and are already happy.