Hyderabad:For quite sometime now, there had been talk of Facebook releasing a new app called Slingshot, its own version of Snapchat. This week, when the app did come out, the big news in the social messaging space was not of its release itself, but about how something unexpected happened, Yo.
A recent article brought to light the fact hours after Facebook released Slingshot earlier this week, that a new app called Yo is doing better than Slingshot. When we dig deeper into what Yo really does, there lies the surprise, the app simply lets users send the word ‘Yo’ or ‘Yo Yo’ to their contacts. In fact it has even received $1 million in funding from angel investors. That sent the industry in a tizzy, with most baffled about its popularity. Slingshot was ranked at No. 50, while Yo was ranked No. 47 in Apple’s App Store recently
On Apple’s App Store, Yo cracked the top 150 free apps on Wednesday night, and continued to rise in the rankings overnight. On Thursday morning, Yo was ranked No. 47 in Apple’s App Store, surging ahead of Slingshot, which is ranked at No. 50. Although these rankings are based on the U.S. App Store, the one market where Slingshot is currently available, the results might not vary much once these apps are available to the entire world.
What makes the whole episode worse is that Slingshot was released amidst a lot of publicity, whereas Yo was launched quietly in April. The only consolation for Facebook in this unexpected app war is that it is leading Yo on Android. While Slingshot has had 10,000 to 50,000 installs, Yo has had only 5,000 to 10,000 installs, according to the Google Play store stats.
The most interesting aspect of this episode is the fact that an app that simply sends the word “Yo” can receive just as much attention and traction as an app from the largest social network in the world, which goes to show just how competitive and unpredictable the mobile messaging market can be. The makers of Yo although assure that the app isn’t just about saying ‘yo’. They call it context-based messaging, a way of sending notifications to near and dear in the most succinct manner.
