What is and what should be
When Facebook Home was announced last week, I knew it wasn't made for me. I don't run my life through Facebook or really want to spend more time in that environment than I need to.
I made that clear in my last post because I really do feel like something new needs to exist.
But when i installed the Facebook update for iOS last week, one of the Facebook Home features included was the chat heads messaging feature. In the past few days I've put the chat heads feature through its paces and I have to say, it's a good thing.
On the surface it seems like a cheesy little bubble that pops up when somebody messages you, and it is. But its not how it looks but how it works that intrigues me.
When you have a chat head open you can stick it to either side of the app to stay mostly out of the way, or close it all together by dragging it to the bottom. It's very simple and very easy to ignore. But the best part of it is that no matter what you do in the Facebook app, it stays where you left it and functions the same. It seems to function completely independent of the app itself, in a consistent and persistent manner. It allows the messages to be quickly addressed while never taking you out of the part of the app you were using.
But this is only so useful in one app, especially one I don't use all that often. However, what I understand of Facebook Home's functionality on the HTC First phone is that the chat heads exist in every part of the phone and work for other messaging service, including texts.
IF implemented correctly, I think a persistent messaging service (like chat heads) that works across all apps and all parts of the OS (like Facebook Home) could become the standard for all mobile operating systems in the near future.
Fully realized, I believe It will alleviate the need constantly switch between apps and messaging, or use clunky pull down menus and improve the fluidity of smart phone software overall. I spend about 70 percent of the time using my phone as a computer to pull information from the web and maybe 30 percent to message other people. Allowing the 30 percent to operate seamlessly with the other 70 percent is going to subtly (but importantly) improve the still imperfect way we interact with our phones.
Much like the pull-to-refresh feature is a standard gesture in most apps today, persistent messaging needs to become standard OS feature as well. And I hope that engineers at Apple and Google and Windows and Blackberry and whoever see that too, because as good as chat heads are, I'm still meh about Facebook.
