Just weeks after launching the sticker feature, WhatsApp has teamed up with Disney to launch new sticker pack that is based on the Disney’s animated movie Ralph Breaks the Internet
HIGHLIGHTS
- It does not take much time for anything to go viral on WhatsApp
- WhatsApp has teamed up with Disney to launch new sticker pack
- The road to hell is paved with good intentions. In the case of tech companies and services, often an irritating user experience is result of something that initially seems like fun but then becomes torturous as more and more people use it. There are so many examples. Food pictures on Instagram. Check-ins on Facebook. Live location sharing or read receipts on WhatsApp. Soon, you will see the WhatsApp Sticker feature added to the list.
- WhatsApp got support for stickers a few weeks ago, and for now users are loving it. it’s fun way to chat. But it is also a service, that opens up door for WhatsApp to make some money and chances are that the chat app will use the opportunity. In the coming days, whether from WhatsApp or from every company worth its salt looking to use stickers for advertisement, there will be a number of sticker packs. They will be so many and probably used to spam WhatsApp users so badly and madly they you will hate them.
- The signs are already there. Just weeks after launching the sticker feature, WhatsApp has teamed up with Disney to launch new sticker pack that is based on the Disney’s animated movie Ralph Breaks the Internet that was released in India on November 23. Notably, these stickers are chargeable and both Android as well as iOS users need to pay some amount to purchase these stickers. These stickers are expected to increase the footfall at movie theatres and make it popular even among those who are not that aware of the movie. Everything sounds sane till now but what happens when WhatsApp starts signing similar deals with India’s entertainment industry. Or for that matter any company that is willing to pay the price to get its special sticker pack.
- Imagine this: you wake up one morning that your WhatsApp chat is flooded with one of Salman Khan’s movie stickers. How about stickers based on Dabbang’s another sequel. Or your best friend has stopped replying to you in texts and instead sends Krrish-4 movie stickers. Bollywood stickers would become the next spamming good morning message on the chat app and you can only imagine how irritating it would be then.
- It does not take much time for anything to go viral on WhatsApp. We have seen how Stickers packs have already become a hit on the chat platform. People today choose texting over voice calls and they will accept every available options to give up their texting.
- The idea of stickers based on Bollywood movies — or any other service, product or a company — is not new. Hike Messenger, an Indian chat platform, already has similar stickers. The important bit to note here is that the other chat apps and services don’t have the pull or the massive user base that WhatsApp has. So maybe we can still live with promotional stickers on Hike or similar chat apps. But once the advertisement comes to WhatsApp in the form of stickers and people get spam messages, all the joy and fun from the stickers will go away.
Source: India Today