Hardly a month goes by without the social network having to file a data breach. At the company’s developer conference in San Jose, California, Facebook CEO Zuckerberg is seeking new trust.
Mark Zuckerberg grins when he says he understands that his company does not currently enjoy much trust. Not everything will change immediately, he says. „Give us time and let us prove that we are serious,“ says the 34-year-old in front of the 5,000 developers. The reorientation will also require changes to how the company is run.
Especially the messenger app, which comes to 1.3 billion active users a month, Zuckerberg wants to radically rebuild and expand its mainstay. It has been reprogrammed from scratch. In the future, there should also be a separate desktop version for the Windows and Mac PC.
Noteworthy: Zuckerberg only briefly addresses WhatsApp as he compares the size of both apps. He proudly points out that the Facebook Messenger is only 30 MB in size, smaller than WhatsApp, an app that was particularly popular in Europe and that Facebook had bought in 2014.
From the marketplace to the living room
Zuckerberg has repeatedly referred to Facebook as a major public marketplace in recent weeks. The company’s messaging app, on the other hand, is a private living room for him. That’s what the conversion is all about.
Consequently, the Messenger should be switched to a secure end-to-end encryption, on whose messages not even Facebook has access, says the 34-year-old. Messages can then be deleted irretrievably.
In future versions, the messenger users should also be able to reach users who are registered with WhatsApp and Instagram but do not have a Facebook account.
There will also be a „mini-Facebook“ in the new messenger app – an area for closest friends to chat with most frequently. There you can share links and pictures similar to the „big“ Facebook. In party mode, all users who are in the same chatroom can watch videos at the same time.
New design for Facebook
Lighter and clearer – the company has also missed out on a new design for its smartphone app and in the browser. In the next few days it will be changed in the app, on the desktop will follow the new, airier design shortly.
In contrast, the project VR glasses remains the problem child. As a reminder, five years ago, Facebook had bought the VR eyewear manufacturer Oculus. The company wanted not only to enter the hardware market, but also to launch VR applications for games and videos in a new business area. So far, however, the success remains.
Now the company introduces two new VR glasses. Especially on the new model „Oculus Quest“ Facebook hopes: It comes without connection to a computer and has no external sensors. In Germany, the new glasses will come from the end of May for 449 euros on the market.
Dating via Facebook
Last year, the network announced that it would not leave the market alone to Tinder and Bumble, the two leading dating apps. With its new dating platform, it wants to offer a currently free alternative. It is only available to some South American and Asian countries. At the end of the year, the offer should start in the USA. If and when it comes to Europe, was not announced.
Despite these announcements, it remained true that no major news was to be expected from the developer conference.
Zuckerberg praises the privacy
A subordinate sentence of Zuckerberg’s speech makes the dilemma for the developers but clear: The would have to adjust to it, so the Facebook boss, future significantly less access to the data pool of Facebook to get. Of course, there was no applause for that. After all, it was just such an outside developer that made the Cambridge Anlytica scandal possible because Facebook had granted him access to 87 million user data.
In addition, Zuckerberg was careful not to mention the recent scandals, such as the live streaming of the rampage in Christchurch, New Zealand. For him, only one message was important today: „The Future is Private – The future is private“.
