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WhatsApp To End Support For BlackBerry, Nokia, and Other Older Operating Systems (whatsapp.com)

Posted by timothy on from the not-even-the-back-burner dept.

nerdyalien writes: While everybody is immersed in the Apple vs. FBI case, WhatsApp has posted a blog entry that could potentially alter the mobile landscape as we know it today. By the end of 2016, WhatsApp will no longer support many older mobile operating systems from BlackBerry, Nokia, Android and Windows Phone. Moving forward, WhatsApp will only support the latest and greatest iPhone, Android and Windows Phone platforms. With over 1 billion active users, and the backing of Facebook, is WhatsApp finally reducing the mobile landscape to a three-horse race ?

6 of 188 comments (clear)

  1. 3 horse? by bigpat · · Score: 4, Insightful

    With over 1 billion active users, and the backing of Facebook, is WhatsApp finally reducing the mobile landscape to a three-horse race ?

    Seriously Windows phone is less than 3%. The only thing keeping it in the vicinity of relevant is the money that Microsoft spends marketing it.

    1. Re:3 horse? by DogDude · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Seriously Windows phone is less than 3%. The only thing keeping it in the vicinity of relevant is the money that Microsoft spends marketing it.

      I know that I couldn't care less how many other people use Windows Phone. I use it because it's a better product.

      --
      I don't respond to AC's.
  2. Re:WhatsApp? by fph+il+quozientatore · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Whatsapp is extremely popular in Europe, where text messages are often billed separately on phone accounts. Most people I know use it, whether they are 10, 30, or 50.

    --
    My first program:

    Hell Segmentation fault

  3. Re:LOL ... whatever ... by ledow · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Not quite.

    It's the de-facto replacement for stupendously limiting and expensive text and picture messages, which outside of contracts can run into thousands per Mb of actual data.

    All with an app that cost 69p per year, free for the first year, and has just recently been made free forever.

    It's like loading up MSN Messenger on your phone so you don't have to send a text. It just so happens to have made a brand name for itself in the process.

    If telcos didn't charge ridiculous amounts for picture messages - especially from abroad - their business model would be dead overnight. It basically uses your data connection to do what the telcos should have been doing all along, but would rather sting you.

  4. Re:Just What Exactly is Whats App doing... by johanw · · Score: 4, Insightful

    End to end encryption with the Axolotl protocol.

  5. Re:Blackberry has moved to Android already by edtice1559 · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I'm a huge Blackberry fan and I'm actually excited about a Priv (once I can get one for less than $700 that is) There are two great things about the Blackberry Q devices. The keyboard and the hub. If you haven't ever used Blackberry Hub you don't know what your missing. Kind of like somebody who has never had air conditioning. It used to be that Android security was too weak to build anything actually secure. (Give an app every permission it wants or don't install it). That's no longer the case. Since it's not the QNX based OS that is the differentiating feature, this isn't a surprise. The hub only works wonderfully if the apps are implemented properly. The hub allows composting of data between multiple apps without any of it leaking. So you get a list of things in chronological order. Also can do things like look in all of your address books for incoming calls. (iOS and Android can't do this if the address books are in virtual secure areas which is how all enterprises configure). And of course a keyboard.