WhatsApp is rolling out ads. In an update on Monday, Meta announced that it will now show ads from businesses through its Stories-like status feature.
Meta says it will tailor the ads to your interests by using “limited” information, including your country or city, language, the channels you follow, and how you interact with ads on the platform. You can also change your ad preferences from Meta’s Accounts Center.
This isn’t the only change Meta is making to WhatsApp. The company will also start showing promoted channels when you click on the Explore button to find new ones to follow. It’s also rolling out the ability to subscribe to channels to “receive exclusive updates” as well.
Always a bit shocked to learn people still use WhatsApp.
You’re shocked to learn that people use an app with over 9 billion installs. Are you just fucking stupid?
It’s like the de facto messaging app for a good portion of the world
I have a buddy in Japan who was a foreign exchange student here in the U.S. years ago. When he went back home I had to use Line to talk to him, I tried for years to get him to use Signal and after years of nagging he agreed to start using Discord… well at least it’s not Whatsapp…
All our clients use it. It’s bloody annoying. I have dozens who use WhatsApp, and like three who use Signal. Ironically, the three that use Signal also use WhatsApp and guess which one they use to contact us?
It’s a problem when it’s got mass market traction to get people to switch. I’m still trying to get off Messenger but some people insist on it… Going to have to get firm about that.
It’s really big in Europe for some reason.
Which is funny, because it’s very popular in Asian countries and Mexico too.
Because SMS is trash, most of Europe doesn’t use iPhones and WhatsApp was one of the first messaging apps, so yeah.
One of the first movers, so many chat groups are still on there and it’s very difficult to make people move. Many people simply don’t care about privacy, ads, user experience and what not, they just want the convenience of staying in the chat groups they are already in. A shame really.
All of my community groups are on there, including the school parents one. My choice is to not participate in the community or have Whatsapp… Or worse, Facebook.
Some of us don’t have another choice. All (but 1) of my support groups are on WhatsApp and only 1 is on signal.
I had to do it because many use it and I was not. If you want to communicate in certain parts of the world, this is the only way. I wish everyone would go to Signal or Telegram but everyone are not me.