George Yang, Author at Goody Feed

In the last few weeks, we’ve been writing a lot about Huawei because people like to read them and we get more clicks we’re extremely worried for Huawei users. And in many of our articles, we kept on wondering: when is Facebook, who also owns WhatsApp and Instagram, going to make the move, too? After all, just like Google, they’re a US company. And most importantly, with their not-so-ideal relationship with the US authorities, you can bet that toeing the line would be a good PR win for them. And today, they’ve finally made the move. Official: Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram Aren’t Going to be Pre-installed in New Huawei Phones Now, before you go apeshit and sell your Huawei phones, hold your horses. It’s not doomsday yet. Instead, I’m going to go out on a limb and say this is actually yet another long-term win for Huawei. Read on and you’ll understand. But first, the breaking news: in a move that everyone expected that caught no one by surprise, Facebook is no longer allowing pre-installs of its family of apps (primarily Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp for us) in new Huawei phones. You see, if you’ve bought a new phone, you’d notice that some apps are already pre-installed in your phone: known as “bloatwares”, some of these apps are used very often by users while some are just pure nonsense apps that we delete once we start up our phones. And of course, Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp are apps that we use very often. In this instance, any Huawei phones that have yet to leave the factory would not be installed with Facebook apps, though they’re still running on Android. Currently Huawei phones, and Huawei phones that have left the factory (i.e. in shops or fulfilment centres) would still have the apps pre-installed. Huawei hasn’t commented on this latest revelation. Current Phones Won’t be Affected So, you’re holding a Huawei phone and wonder if you’d receive the latest filter from Instagram. Fret not; the Facebook family of apps would still be updated. And if you’ve bought a Huawei phone without Facebook apps, there’s no need to worry, too: you can simply download them from Google Play Store. How About Future Huawei Phones? Honestly speaking, this sounds much like the Google ban, but here’s the difference: so far, Facebook hasn’t banned the China giant from using their apps, so should you buy a Huawei phone with their new OS (rumoured to be called Ark), you can download Facebook apps through their own app store. Unless, of course, Facebook decided not to create apps for Huawei’s new OS, or simply want to ban Huawei altogether. And if that happens, that would really be doomsday for Huawei. Could Be Another Blessing in Disguise I wasn’t clickbaiting when I said that. You see, those bloatwares (pre-installed apps) aren’t randomly chosen by the manufacturers or telecoms. Some of them actually paid money to the manufacturer or telecoms to have them pre-installed in the phones. According to a Fortune article, a telecom in the US charges USD$1 to USD$2 for an app to be pre-installed in each phone. But wait: doesn’t that mean Huawei would earn less money? Apparently not; because when it comes to popular apps, it might be the other way around. Over in Europe, which happens to be Huawei’s key market outside of China, Google actually takes a “licensing fee” from phone makers if the phone makers want popular Google apps to be pre-installed in the phone. Now, of course we don’t know the whole arrangement between the Internet giants and phone manufacturers: does Facebook charge a fee as well? Or maybe Huawei pays Facebook? We won’t know, but if a user is conditioned to install these apps themselves, it’ll potentially save the manufacturer a lot of money and headache. In other words, let’s just summarise this entire incident again: a sleeping giant has been awakened.

George Yang

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