Technology & IT | Friday 27 March, 2015 12:53 pm |

Facebook’s Messenger app is evolving into a multitasking tool equipped to send an animated fist bump to a friend at one moment and then get a little business done in the next.
In an effort to pull off the transformation, Facebook Inc. is opening Messenger so outside programmers can build features tailored for the service.
By the end of April, Messenger will also be adding the ability to display store receipts and shipping information to help consumers keep track of their interactions with merchants and other businesses.
The push to diversify Messenger addresses a potential threat to Facebook’s ubiquitous social network posed by a variety of mobile messaging maps offering more intimate and direct ways to connect with friends.
Younger people, in particular, are increasingly using a wide range of mobile messaging apps to communicate while spending less time broadcasting their activities on Facebook’s more expansive social network.
The list of apps pulling people away from Facebook includes Snapchat, KakaoTalk, Kik, Line, Secret, Tango, Viber, and Whisper.



Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg touted the Messenger expansion Wednesday to about 2,000 app developers at the opening of a two-day conference in San Francisco.
“We have been building Messenger into a service to express beyond text,” Zuckerberg said.
He promised even more features will be rolling out the months ahead.
Since Messenger’s introduction four years ago, Facebook already has added the ability to attach video, share videos, swap stickers, make phone calls and send money.
Thanks largely to its Facebook ties, Messenger already has more than 600 million users, Zuckerberg said. Facebook’s social network is more than twice as large with about 1.4 billion users.