Windows will Shut Down Facebook Messenger?

I found this article that Windows will shut down Facebook Messenger and it caught my attention instantly. Even though this article, and the message provided by Facebook does not provide much information, it is still interesting as to why the app will be shutting down for Windows users. The message provided by Facebook is the screen shot below.

I hope more information on this issue will be provided before or prior to the shut down. The article states that the news of the shut down comes three days after a statement had been made that Facebook and Windows were working together to make Facebook Messenger accessible to Windows users and not just Android and Apple users. 

http://thenextweb.com/facebook/2014/02/26/facebook-messenger-windows-will-shut-march-3/#!xKp0n

"Generation Why?"

This article was very interesting to me for a number of reasons, but one that stood out to me the most was the idea of people living behind a Facebook wall. The argument between why Facebook was created and what it is actually doing to us is the articles major concern. Facebook was created to connect people and give basic information about each other to stay connected. That sounds great on paper, but the reality of it is there are so many other ways of staying connected with people and being actual real life friends with people that sitting behind a computer and saying you're staying in touch with them. I thought it was interesting that the article also said that Zuckerberg thinks personal trivia is what "friendship" is. That suggestion may have single handedly changed my perspective on Facebook.

I was an avid Facebook user back when I was in high school (2006-2010) when it was very easy to use and a new thing so every body was using it. I loved it at first, but then it got old, quick. As soon as new features were added I stopped using it all together. There was always a lot of hype about Facebook in school such as Who was where, with who? or Who was dating who? or Who broke up for the 6th time? That is when I started to realize how much Facebook was controlling and/or ruining real life relationships. Teens were overly using this site and essentially ruining their real life friendships, which was super sad to me.

I cannot say I completely agree with the article in the fact that I believe the initial concept of Facebook was great, but the way we turned it around and started using it to basically "creep" on people and "stay in touch" with them through a computer really made me not want to use it anymore. I say "stay in touch" because do we really stay in touch with people, or do we just look at their information provided, pictures, and where they are working and say we are keeping in touch with them? http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2010/nov/25/generation-why/?pagination=false

Google: For the choosing self

Google completely caters to the choosing self. One of the many things Google does extremely well is that they make the user feel special as they use Google. For example, on my birthday, the Google title was customized into a birthday font and when I moved my curser over the title, "Happy Birthday Amanda" popped up in a little window. As a Google user, I thought this was awesome, and it made me think about the extra miles Google actually does go to insure a positive experience for Google users.  

Not only does Google customize pages, they also customize searches for the user based on their past search history. Google is the most used search engine for these obvious reasons. 

Community on the Web

Google: The Role of a Medium

When we talked about Google as a medium, the explanation I got out of the discussion was that Google is a medium because it connects us with our end results. We go on Google for information that is interesting to us, Google as a company, filters us to web searches that we would be interested in based on our past browsing history, and instantly we are connected with the best possible results for our search. Without Google, it would be extremely time consuming to go and find books from the library that interest us or give us the results we are looking for. Google connects us with anything and everything on the web, that is how it serves as a great medium. However, although it does serve us as a great medium, I question how the way we rely on Google for everything is a good or bad thing.