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> The FTC and states stood by for years while Facebook invested billions of dollars and millions of hours to make Instagram and WhatsApp into the apps that user

• beagle3 6y ago
  WhatsApp was popular, but iirc didn’t have video calls or group phone calls (and perhaps not even 1-1 calls). It is likely true that FB funded WhatsApp’s continuing relevance. It is just as likely , though, that WhatsApp would develop these features regardless - at perhaps a slightly slower pace. WhatsApp’s expenses were compatible with $1/user/year they were charging in some markets (and which they would likely be able to charge in most of all). If FB didn’t fund it , someone else - perhaps the users - would have. But it was the growth (evidence for which was collected through Onavo) and implied threat that made FB buy them, not anything else.