Tricks of the App WeChat - Article Example

WeChat WeChat When it comes to messaging, WeChat is the fastest growing app; a majority of people finds it handy especially the young or teenager. It is an app of Chinese origin, a country that is home to most of its users. A person can use the app to send text messages, photos and video files instantly to a friend, the walkie-talkie function incorporated in the app makes it much easier to use and relieves the users from the monotony of having to key in characters. Globalvoiceonline.com affirms that in just a couple of months, the heat of WeChat growth is already being felt by competitors like Sino Weibo who are complaining of decline in usage as compared to the early years before WeChat captured the air. This app is available for most smartphone systems including android, blackberry, windows phone, Nokia and iPhone. WeChat have experienced a speedy increase in popularity since it was launched in the year 2011, Tencent, the company to which the world owes the development of this app confirms that the number of users have doubled within a period of six months from 100 million to 200 million people. For the records, it has always been difficult for any china based internet firms to go global to several constraints such as cyber security issues. However, WeChat it is promising to change the rules. Already, the app have been launched in Asia and is receiving some subscription from United Kingdom and USA. It comes with similar features to USA owned WhatsApp but with more capabilities than its analogous app. The features resembles those of twitter, Skype and Facebook. It comes in eight different major languages including English, Russian and Arabic. Just like other communication apps, it can access the users’ security information such as text messages, contacts and determine their location. This is considered a threat to the users, for instance, one becomes susceptible to surveillance when such information can be obtained without his or her knowledge. We chat have a number of great features that makes it’s a darling of many users, from the keyboard input to walkie-talkie and other personalized operation. This paper discusses unique WeChat tricks. Code messaging: WeChat have fantastic code messages that one can use by simply typing a portion of the code word. For instance, by typing the word “birthday” only and sending it to your friend, it will deliver a complete message with the word “happy birthday” and cakes falling from the top of the screen. Typing the word “miss” delivers a complete message as “I miss you” and flowers falling from the top of the screen. Teenager always find this features to be very fascinating. WeChat voice messaging: This function enables the user to send his voice record to a friend. The person only needs to record the voice and use a variety of effects that are made available by the app to achieve the right tone then send it to a friend Updating texts instead of moments: in almost all messaging platforms, “moments” are specifically used to share photos, but for WeChat one can share a text as a moment by holding the camera icon for around three minutes after which a text box appears. One can also avoid the boredom of viewing moment updates from one person by hiding moments from that particular person. Clicking on the person name and adding the person to hidden friends saves you the wasted time of having to view one person’s moments multiple times. Mentioning people in WeChat comments: Unlike other social networks where you have to key in someone’s identity into the comment in order to mention them. WeChat presents a much easier procedure, you only need to click on the person’s comment if the person had commented earlier and the person’s name will be automatically mentioned in your text when you finish entering your comments. Seeing images used on WeChat: WeChat enables the user not to see any image sent or received during chats, the user can follow a few simple steps to find the image bank. Click on the WeChat’s folder named Tencent, which is normally found in the SD card, select “micro messaging” folder and then “randomly like”. The next step is going to the “image2” folder and searching for all the “jpg” files saved in it. All the images will be displayed and you can sort and delete all the unnecessary ones using message delete function. By adding these, the user saves a lot of memory space. This trick is one of the useful WeChat features. Inviting friends to join you: Sometimes you need a friend to join you, but either you do not know the address of your location or too tired to give a comprehensive address, WeChat have the “location” features can help you do this. On the chat-screen, click on the “plus” icon them select “location”, the app will determine your current location and you can send it to your friend for convenience. Finding nearby people by shake: Shake is a unique feature of WeChat that enables one to find nearby WeChat users by simply shaking the phone. When people shake their phones, they are able to identify random people who are also shaking their phone after which they can send each other short messages for approval to connect. This also allows one to disable such people if one gets tired of random messages from such people. This can be done by going to the settings features then selecting the particular feature one needs to disable, click on disable to complete the action. Drift bottle: this feature allows one to send random voice or text messages to the general audience. All that one needs to do is enter the text or record the voice in a bottle then send it to the ocean. Another person can pick the bottle and check on its content, if he or she finds the content to be useful, he or she can text the sender. One can also do the same by picking bottles from the ocean. Unlike the “shake feature” where you can shake multiple times without limit, one can only pick a maximum of eight bottles from the ocean in a day. Walkie-talkie: A part from chatting by text, one can also communicate in walkie-talkie mode by sending voice messages. The person needs to go to the recipient’s profile and click on the “plus” icon then select walkie-talkie feature. If the other person joins the chat, one can hold the central wheel down and talk, one releasing the wheel the app automatically send the message to the intended recipient. Video chatting: Just like Skype, WeChat also offers video chat, but one need a fast internet connection to do this, either a 3G internet connection or a fast Wi-Fi connection otherwise there will be intermittent communication. Moments and comments: people like to share images about their favorite moments or location, at the same time one can also receive other people’s moments and comment on them, most people find these a realistic way of meeting with friends. Using location data to find nearby people: WeChat have the ability to determine one’s location by using available networks and GPS, one can also use this feature to find nearby people and send them chat request. Other people can also use the same feature to locate ones location so to avoid this, one needs to clear his or her location data. Scanning QR codes: QR code is a set of boxes designed to store a particular information. WeChat can scan QR codes created by other people and helps the user to access the owner’s profile; one can also create his or her QR code and make it available to other people. The Facebook feature link allows users to share their QR codes with your friend on Facebook without having to login to one account. WeChat official accounts: Official accounts are used mostly to connect one to their favorite celebrities. By adding a person to one’s official account, one will be able to receive updates from the celebrity such as his or her messages and exclusive pics. Broadcast messaging: it is sometimes cumbersome to send messages to people one by one if the content of the message is the same, in this case one can use the broadcast messaging to deliver the message to multiple recipients at the same time. WhatsApp also have a similar feature. Not everyone have been comfortable with the growth in WeChat, politician and human rights activists have already raised and alarm over the app’s security issues. They claim that the app can be used to monitor peoples movement without their knowledge by cybercriminals. Legislators believe that the app possess a threat to every users’ security by exposing one confidential messages. Tencent says that user security protection have been considered seriously in the development of the app, they also affirm that they have conformed to local legislations in countries where they operate. Adam, experts in cyber security issue claims that all communication apps have some level of security shortcomings and therefore WeChat should not be singled out in this case. He add that the fact that an app may have been made in USA does not mean that it is immune to cyber-attacks, the problem may be originating from the handset and not the app. Reference Globalvoiceonline.com Read More