According to online sources, Facebook has decided to abandon its plans to start showing advertising content to users of the popular WhatsApp messenger, which it owns. According to reports, the development team responsible for integrating advertising content into WhatsApp was recently disbanded.
The company's plans to begin displaying advertising in the WhatsApp app were announced in 2018. It was originally planned to appear in the "Status" section, allowing you to post Instagram Stories-style content, starting in 2020. The announcement comes a few months after WhatsApp co-founder Jan Koum left the company. WhatsApp messenger became the property of Facebook in 2014, and in 2017, the second founder of the service, Brian Acton, left the company. Disagreements over the methods of monetizing the messaging service became the reason why the creators of WhatsApp left the company. Initially, they conceived the messenger as a simple and secure service without advertising. However, after WhatsApp became part of Facebook, everything changed as the company generates a significant portion of its revenue through contextual advertising.
It's not entirely clear whether Facebook is completely abandoning plans to integrate advertising content into WhatsApp. The message states that the company "plans to introduce advertising in the 'Status' section at some point." This means that in the future, advertising may still appear inside the popular messenger. For now, the developers intend to focus on creating features for their business users that are expected to generate revenue. A large number of people, especially in developing countries, use WhatsApp for business, so the company has long started introducing features that may be useful to commercial customers.
Source: 3dnews.ru