Facebook Messenger's new users can sign up for the mobile app without having an existing account in the social media, like WhatsApp. Facebook's latest move indicates it wants mobile device users to choose Messenger as their default chat app. However, the company's and application's close link could be preventing the latter's full growth potential.
The accountless system will roll out in the United States and Canada before other global regions. It only requests a user to input a first and last name, and phone number, according to Hindustan Times.
Messenger users can still connect with current friends. This is done by allowing the app to match up contact entries with Facebook profiles. TechCrunch has implied that this puts an accountless Messenger user on Facebook's Social Graph.
This latest move follows Facebook's major changes to Messenger. The social networking giant first removed it from its application, and then gave the app its own Internet site, according to Wired.
The new move could seem surprising, since Facebook and Messenger are two popular Internet centerpieces that have worked in tandem. However, that could have resulted in limited growth for the latter.
In fact, Facebook Messenger became a complete platform when it launched a payments feature in March. The week after Facebook announced 40 new mobile apps for it.
Next, in April video calls became a new feature on Messenger. Then its first game was launched a couple of weeks ago.
Facebook has stressed the benefits of staying linked to Messenger. One of its engineers, Louis Boval, said of Messenger's new accountless system that it makes messaging Facebook friends easier, and they can access their Facebook messages.
Interestingly, Facebook bought the messenger app WhatsApp last year for $19 billion. However, the social networking company argues that the two applications complete each other, For example, Facebook Messenger includes more features and United States users than WhatsApp.