Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg listens to a question from the audience after unveiling a new messaging system during a news conference in San Francisco, California November 15, 2010. [Photo: Xinhua/Reuters]
Facebook announced on Monday that it would launch a new messaging platform, providing an email address of "@facebook.com."
At a press conference in San Francisco, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg introduced the three features defining the new service which he called a "modern messaging product": seamless messaging, conversation history and a social inbox for "filtering exactly the messages you want to see."
The new system combines multiple forms of communication including SMS, IMs, email as well as chat messages from Facebook and other platforms. It also allows users to communicate in real- time through whatever medium or device is convenient for them, Facebook wrote in a blog post.
"This is not an email killer," said Zuckerberg at the press conference, as the service has been dubbed as "Gmail killer" by the press. "This is a messaging system that includes email as one part of it."
The young CEO called email "slow", saying that "we don't think modern messaging system will be email." He noted that the "next generation" messaging will be seamless, informal, immediate, personal, simple, minimal and short, but not email.
The social network will be rolling the new service out in the coming month, first via invitation. All Facebook users will eventually be offered the email addresses matching their usernames.
