Why Chat Rooms Are The Hot Social Media In 2015

The long-lost chat room is experiencing a renaissance, and social media companies new and old are hoping to capitalize on the trend.

Apps and services that allow users to real-time chat are experiencing a kind of renaissance, with the likes of Banter, Rooms, and HipChat muscling in on email and text messaging. The da Vinci of this particular revival is Slack—the just-over-one-year-old service has already nabbed a $1.12 billion valuation and hooked more than 250,000 users. Its allure? A central chat room for employees to share messages, photos, and company updates.

The act of chatting online with strangers—that phenomenon that first found its footing in the '90s, with clunky design and dial-up access—is fashionable beyond the workplace. In October, Facebook launched Rooms, a way for users to anonymously swap photos and comments about shared interests. "In Rooms you can be 'Wonder Woman'—or whatever name makes you feel most comfortable and proud," writes the Rooms development team in their inaugural blog post.

Read Full Story

[image error]