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Evidence receipt / belief

Published · transcript-backed

Ben Gilbert: belief

29 Jan 2020 Acquired WhatsApp

“I think AIM was demoed on stage as this is a really good way to use notifications to send messages to people.”

— Ben Gilbert

Source trail

Everything needed to verify it.

Speaker
Ben Gilbert
Attribution
Verified speaker
Claim type
belief
Recorded
29 Jan 2020
Publisher
Acquired
Episode
WhatsApp

Transcript context

…It was desktop right? Originally. It was desktop, exactly, but then they were one of the early companies to have an app. I should go watch old WWDC videos, but I do think they were at one of these. I think AIM was demoed on stage as this is a really good way to use notifications to send messages to people. If you’re out there wondering why didn’t those companies just do it, they did. They brought the functionality. They ported from desktop, so it had potentially too many features, it was not necessarily a need or a feeling experience, but it also didn’t have the genius thing that that Jan had with the network being based on phone numbers. Yeah. Nobody else had that. That was a major key to WhatsApp’s success and ability to outstrip all of the new entrants, AIM, Meebo, and all these legacy guys transitioning. The other important thing to remember about what was going on at this time was there, you’re going to say BBM?…

Stored transcript either side of the excerpt. The highlighted words are the published quote; the surrounding text is unedited source, never generated.

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