Hyderabad: After witnessing a decline in usage in USA and Canada in the fourth quarter of 2017, Facebook has seemingly shifted its focus to India considering the alluring size of its population. The social media giant is testing a new feature, which allows audio clips to be added to status messages, with a segment of Indian users.
Facebook was built with the intention of bringing people closer by allowing them to share personal content. “We are always working to help people connect with their friends and family in ways that are authentic to them. Voice clips give people a new medium to express themselves,” a Facebook spokesperson was quoted as saying by TechCrunch.
However, off late, Facebook has become a platform for sharing generic content in the form of videos and news articles, which leaves hardly any room for personal conversations. Consequently, a large number of users have drifted away from Facebook to other platforms which foster more personal communication.
The introduction of this new features seems to be a desperate attempt by the platform to keep users engaged. Users with whom this feature is being tested see an “Add Voice Clip” button within their status update options.
However, a lot of them have complained that the app crashes whenever they try to record an audio clip. It is evident that this new feature is still in its beta stage, and it requires some fine-tuning.
Techie Ravi Kumar says, “When I click on the audio clip option, I get an error message which says that the Facebook App has stopped working and that it needs to be restarted. I have tested this feature on my friends’ phones, and the application crashes on their phones as well.”
Given the fact that India has several languages, it is easier for developers to create an option for users to record and post audio messages rather than create keyboards for individual languages. This feature will also cater to people who are not comfortable with written communication.
