If you’ve already blown out twenty candles, most likely a “buzz” Be more to you than that frustrating swarm of velutinas that seem to pierce your brain when you spend too much time near a speaker or listen to music at full throttle with headphones.
At least that’s how it was when you were a kid, you came home in the afternoon, locked yourself in your room, and turned on that huge, humming computer to chat with your classmates. A “buzz” back then—To be exact!—was an annoying “tap” when a friend insisted you read the message he just sent you, or simply wanted to touch your nose.
be disturbed It’s like drinking soda next to a speaker, but your ears didn’t hurt. On the contrary: if there are beeps, they are probably the ones sending you the “buzz”.
The thing about flickering windows was that it was just part of the big suitcase that MSN Messenger came into our lives to be the king of instant messaging for a while.
The years of “buzz” and “blink”
The same trunk had customizable text fonts, abundance of icons the late Baroque format—there were screens that eventually evolved into authentic typographical salad bowls; the famous “winks”, giant expressions and almost as annoying as the hum; or, of course, the perfect sound accompanying the new messages: that little nerve-racking “sound” you listen to then and today with an even more disturbing sense of melancholy.
And this is normal.
MSN Messenger said goodbye to us almost a decade ago. After becoming an indispensable part of communication at the beginning of the 21st century, it closed its rooms in October 2014. Its history is worth remembering in 2022… And the reasons for its decline.
Origins of MSN Messenger until 1999When Microsoft released its own primitive messaging client compatible with the AIM network and containing only two essential components: text and contact list. The Redmond giant’s bet worked, and the betting known as “Messenger” has become part of the daily life of teenagers with internet access at home.
It allowed real-time chat in privacy light years away from the landline phone in the living room.
Much of its success—and the displeasure it evoked in some—is explained by its eagerness to combine new features and resources. Over time, “El Messenger” has a status bar, a status button to notify your contacts whether you’re connected, busy or offline, an option to stay “invisible”, emoticons, “blink”, “buzz”… in your high school or college years, for you is also more likely to be useful. Files Share Kill time with group work or one of your games.
Over the years, new versions were released and the service was renamed Windows Live Messenger in the mid-2000s. In June 2009, the popular Messenger peaked at 330 million monthly users worldwide. Good data, bad horizon. At least for some instant messaging services born in a different scenario than social networks and smartphones.
As we explained to you in 2018, messaging services ran into a big fundamental problem: your business modelespecially in a rapidly changing Internet that increasingly offers content to users outside the domains of connectivity providers.
Up until then, users who had spent their afternoons buzzing with each other discovered social networks like Facebook, which was launched in 2004, and were getting used to using smartphones; this is a paradigm shift that Messenger has failed to adapt to despite its attempts.
The old program dating back to the 90s, which was hugely successful, has become a fashion with fewer and fewer users. It was not the first and not the last on the Internet. won the victory The era of PCs left its place to social networks and smart phones.
The decline of the service caused Microsoft to start shutting down in 2013, when it decided to integrate it into Skype, which was founded in Denmark a decade earlier and Redmond bought it in May 2011. It closed in China in 2014 and put the dot to one. It’s one of the biggest of the 2000s Network, but there are still nostalgic people who are determined to relive those experiences years ago.
The Messenger left behind a handful of memories.
And meanwhile, a new meaning for “buzz”.
Pictures | Joe Anderson (Flickr)
Source: Xataka
Alice Smith is a seasoned journalist and writer for Div Bracket. She has a keen sense of what’s important and is always on top of the latest trends. Alice provides in-depth coverage of the most talked-about news stories, delivering insightful and thought-provoking articles that keep her readers informed and engaged.