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WhatsApp's Next Version To Include VoIP Calls and Recording
An anonymous reader writes that WhatsApp is adding a feature that may elevate it for many users' purposes: VoIP. "Apps like Viber, Skype, Tango and Google Hangout already support VoIP, which allows you to make voice calls over a broadband connection. Beyond WhatsApp's huge pool of over 600 million active users, which will undoubtedly disrupt cell service providers' payment model, what is even more intriguing is the VoIP recording feature. With the exception of third-party add-ons available for Skype, no other VoIP app includes this feature."
Google Voice or Hangouts of whatever its called now allows recording, just press 4.
By Saudi Arabia, UAE, Oman etc. in the same way as Skype is.
I predict screaming from millions of users who find WhatsApp suddenly blocked by their ISPs.
First, what does the image of sexy exposed mud wrestlers below the text of TFA have to do with Whatsapp or VOIP technology?
Second, all Whatsapp is doing is making existing voip recording technology more mainstream and accessible. Anyone with an Atsterisk/FreePBX server can already do this, but of course that server stuff is not as mainstream as the Whatsapp client. Corporate call centers obviously use this technology every day, and use the disclaimer recorded greeting you must first listen to, before your call can advance in the queue. "This call may be monitored for training purposes" At that point, it is a good idea to also start recording the call on your own, and you're certainly free to do so. *IF* Whatsapp extended beyond its walled garden, this tool would give the plebes a means to record the call centers I've just described.
Third, the Whatsapp Corporation shits on their developers, so watch out. But you knew it is part of Facebook now already, so you weren't expecting much.
You can chat with Skype. I don't pay to receive calls but I do to call people abroad, so voip is the only sensible solution there. You can get a headset for £5 or less and use (on a desktop) with any client. Whatsapp being phone only is what kills it for me. I don't understand why Facebook didn't announce a fix for that the day they bought them. I don't want to have to chat via a mobile phone keyboard and try and cut and paste links etc into it when i'm setting next to a desktop with a keyboard and a 25" monitor.
It's just that the user doesn't have access to the playback function.
"..., which will undoubtedly disrupt cell service providers' payment model"
Service providers already know that there is no future in voice and to count only on data subscriptions moving forward.
blindly antisocialist = antisocial
Why do people use WhatsApp when, at least for Android (which runs on ~80% of the world's smartphones), it's an app that requires a $1/year subscription after your first year, and when there are many free services that do the same thing (any instant messaging service) and more (VoIP, video calls), and which have desktop clients (because I'd rather reply from my laptop when I'm already using it anyway)?
I've thus far refused to use WhatsApp because I find it pointless given the free, arguably better alternatives. Am I missing something? Does WhatApp have some killer feature that no other app/service has? What makes it better than, say, Google Hangouts or Viber (which even has a desktop client for Linux). Am I wrong in thinking that WhatsApp's continued popularity is only due to WhatsApp's existing popularity?
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