WhatsApp
WhatsApp adds a new way for users to gather and chat with Communities, which is intended for organizations such as schools and neighborhoods to coordinate and share media. Communities are WhatsApp’s answer to the huge Telegram groups and channels, and while it is not clear how many users can sign up for a Community, they will not be as many as the “hundreds of thousands” of people chatting with other users, according to an official WhatsApp post on Thursday. Communities will be inherently private and will be end-to-end encrypted. Along with Communities, WhatsApp is adding modern features to rival messaging apps for a while, such as emoji responses and extending voice calls to 32 people, from eight participants before. Users can share even larger files and multimedia now, with an expanded 2 GB file size limit from 100 MB previously. And group administrators will now be able to remove messages from everyone’s conversations if, say, someone says something problematic. The above features will be available to users in the coming weeks, while it is less clear when the Communities will be added to WhatsApp – they will start releasing it slowly, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in a post on Thursday. However, he also noted that community messages (whether called Communities or otherwise) will also come to Messenger, Facebook and Instagram at some point. Get the CNET Mobile newsletter Find the best phones, apps and accessories with the CNET Mobile newsletter. Delivered Tuesday and Thursday.
