Remember Asuka? Recall what messengers were 25 years ago (and how they changed)

The modern history of instant messengers began in the mid-90s with the possible popularization of the Internet. Since that time, messaging apps have changed and increased a lot.

Some services did not stand the test and lost their audience, while others, on the contrary, found themselves under the sun due to timely innovations and innovations.

We propose to consider the main stages of the development of instant messengers and collect the basic principles of modern messaging applications.

Late 90s. Group chats, avatars and statuses

The beginning of the modern history of instant messengers is considered to be 1996. Then a new means of communication via the Internet appeared and began to gain popularity – ICQ. Do not confuse this Windows system PR application with the auditor’s messenger from App Store.

A promising direction was quickly seen in the company Microsoft and in less than 3 years acquired his application – MSN Messenger. The utility subsequently became Windows Live Messenger.

During the first few years of using instant messengers, options appeared that were still considered as the basis for any communication on the network:

▶ nickname – a user ID that was easier to remember than a random sequence of numbers (formerly accounts). ICQ originated from 5-9 digits);

▶ global search – you could find luck and find a friend in his messenger, ancient family, nickname or favorite nickname in computer games;

▶ account status – each user could show their employment or vice versa readiness to communicate;

▶ user avatar and description – the first visual division of users appeared according to the picture of the accounting record and those left in the presentation texts;

▶ basic security settings – accounts were linked to an email address through which it was possible to reset the password or restore the account.

Catalog of ICQ chats on various topics

Became an integral attribute of the messengers of that era group chats. A large number of sites and distribution announcements for collecting and information about such “publics” (then this term was not yet used).

You can find a group by the audience of your favorite movie genre, a group chat in your city, communities of computer game lovers, etc. And a large amount of pirated software was distributed through group chats (torrents were still in their infancy).

Third-party client for ICQ on smartphones and communicators of the time

Data transfer was carried out from user to user. On the one hand, this does not require servers on the side of the messenger, but on the other hand, users are always at risk of getting a virus or other malware. And you can only transfer a file if both users were online.

With the popularization of the mobile Internet, clients for mobile platforms began to appear. It was possible to correspond not only from a computer, but also from a smartphone to Symbian OS or Windows Mobile. Later versions for customers began to be released even on Javawhich made it possible to install on most push-button phones.

2000s. Audio, video calls and stickers

The next important stage in the development of instant messengers was marked by the appearance Skype. The main feature of the application was audio calls and IP-telephony, the capabilities of the messenger went to the service in the load.

The developers managed to create good audio playback algorithms that were implemented comfortably at a low network connection speed. No wonder that Skype quickly spread across different platforms.

Later, the developers implemented the collection of video calls and conferences with many participants.

The first stickers in Asia looked something like this

Another milestone in the history of instant messengers is the appearance of stickers. This is a more advanced version of emoji emoticons. The first arrays in digital form since the advent of the 90s for a simple graphical display of more complex language structures.

Japan is considered the birthplace of emoji, and stickers were also invented there in the late 2000s. They appear more vividly and colorfully express, gesture or consider the words of the interlocutor.

Unicode emoji table for different OS

Emoji has been quickly integrated into the Unicode encoding standard, which quickly adds new characters to various operating systems and applications. Stickers were less fortunate, they did not gain global popularity and were developed for each messenger separately.

These and other innovations were embodied in the increasingly popular whatsapp And Viberwhich debuted in 2009 and 2010, respectively.

2010s to the present day. Large file sharing, clouds and chatbots

The applications now have customizable group chats and publics, additional account protection and two-factor authentication, reactions to messages and editing the entered text.

There are special sections for adding and sharing files, applications have learned to save a solid amount of information.

Chatbots have become an important option of modern messengers, which contain an algorithm for solving frequently asked questions of users without involving a variety of interlocutors.

By the mid-2010s, communication service technologies were becoming more advanced, the audience began to concentrate more in the presence of the main messengers, there is still a competitive struggle between the period.

So messenger Telegram with open roots into an uphill battle with the already shared messaging markets and quickly built up an audience.

The messenger gained popularity due to the lack of restrictions that the participants had. This includes support for multiple accounts in one application, working with files of different types, convenient group chats and channels.

V Telegram ran unobtrusive ads. Over time, it became more and more in the messenger, wanting to take part in such messages.

Unfortunately, the developers have chosen a monetization model that is unloved among users and a paid subscription has appeared in the messenger. Telegram Premium. The subscription includes only two: disabling ads and decoding audio messages. The rest of the options are for amateurs.

The price of a subscription to paid streaming services or bank subscriptions with a set of useful goodies. Not surprisingly, users have again begun to look for suitable features that are comparable to the set of options used.

In addition to the other two market giants whatsapp And Viber a relative novelty in May last year was VK Messenger. Formerly social media posts section In contact with and so the method of communication was considered, but with the separation of the service in a separate application, the release of a number of significant benefits, putting it on a par with other messenger exceptions.

The application is not inferior in terms of results and capabilities, but in terms of data transfer speed and surpasses them. Telegram.

Promising features like transcribing audio messages, uploading large files and supporting multiple accounts are completely free here.

What to expect from messengers in the future

Many smartphone users have accounts in the most popular means of communication. Replacing the main messenger will turn out without much difficulty. The maximum that can be done is to prevent several acquaintances or relatives that you need to write not in a conditional whatsappand in Telegram or VK Messenger.

Now the most common messengers among detainees have an audience in Russia due to various features and capabilities.

► whatsapp lives off the old business audience. Messengers are often representatives of medium and small businesses that have gathered a customer base in the 2010s and are afraid to lose it.

The messenger does not offer any new and interesting features, but instead sets strange restrictions. It is still not possible to use multiple accounts in WhatsApp, there is no completed client for iPad and PC in the messenger.

► Viber fell in love with users for economical consumption of traffic in roaming. During an overseas vacation or business trip, you could easily use the audio connection using cellular data or a slow Wi-Fi connection in a hotel.

The messenger also does not shine with additional options and has strange limitations. There are no settings and options in the iPad client, there is no support for different accounts on the iPhone, message synchronization works very strangely. When switching to a new gadget, you can request to lose part of the correspondence.

► Telegram gained an audience in Russia due to the rapid development and new features. The developers did not hesitate to experiment, listened to the wishes of users and implemented the possibilities at the request of the market.

The appearance of advertising and a paid subscription for its perception aggravated a little.

► VK Messenger accrual of turnover due to multi-million dollar advertising In contact with and the use of useful chips at no additional cost. From the proven solutions on the market, they are selected carefully and begin to choose the best of them. So, for example, in-app quantity could include more accounting, audio message decryption, heavy data transfer at high speed – all for free.

At the same time, the messenger occupies a leading share in terms of manufacturability, while foreign Viber And whatsapp are already far behind. It is the bet on manufacturability in the future that should bring success to instant messengers.

From the competition between services by users who belong only to the winnings, a monopoly in any consumer niche has not yet led to anything good.

In the future, we expect new interesting features of messengers in conjunction with neural networks and chat bots. search, answers to requests in various categories of knowledge and help in solving everyday problems should be a step in the evolution of instant messengers.