Google’s launched a new group messaging app (and it’s a little confusing)
Google has launched a new messenger app called Spaces, designed to get you sharing with your messaging groups straight from Google search and YouTube.
It's yet another attempt to get in on the lucrative WhatsApp bandwagon, but adds to a confusing line up that already includes Google Messenger (which we had forgotten about, to be honest) and Hangouts, which sprung out of desktop messaging feature Google Chat.
It's all getting a little confusing, but the USP (unique selling point) of Spaces appears to be that the functionality is built in to other Google products such as search and YouTube, cutting out the need to jump between what you want to share via message – a gif or article for instance – and a messaging app.
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"Group conversations often don’t stay on topic, and things get lost in endless threads that you can’t easily get back to when you need them," Google said in a blog post, announcing its launch ahead of its big developer conference Google I/O this week.
"We wanted to build a better group sharing experience, so we made a new app calledSpaces that lets people get people together instantly to share around any topic. With Spaces, it’s simple to find and share articles, videos and images without leaving the app, since Google Search, YouTube, and Chrome come built in."
Essentially, you download the app, but you can access the rest of Google through it. Maybe you want to share this very article? You could find it via search in the Spaces app, hit share right there with a group and the messaging and articles will appear together.
Here are the pictures Google shared:
Although the app is due to roll out on Android, iOS, desktop mobile web and Gmail from today, although it is as yet unavailable, making it a little challenging in understanding how it works without seeing it in practice.
It's a little bit WhatsApp/Facebook Messenger, a little bit slack/skype.
Let's just hope it goes better than its previous attempts at social networks with Google+ (yep, it's still around) and Orkut.