A native Android messenger, built from the ground up
Can a mobile messenger make group conversation feel immediate, personal and useful enough to become a community product?
THE PROBLEM
Messaging is a crowded category. A new app has to make the basic loop feel effortless before anyone has a reason to invite the next person.
The product needed to support more than a stream of text. Groups share photos, video and reactions, and the app had to keep those interactions legible on a small screen.
WHAT I DID ABOUT IT
I designed and developed Amity Messenger for Android from the ground up, taking the product from an empty project to a beta launch in September 2016.
The beta supported group conversation, shared media and expressive reactions in a native mobile experience. The later Amity design study documents the broader community-product direction that followed.
TRY IT YOURSELF
The application runs separately. It opens in a new tab.
Read the Amity design study
BEFORE AND AFTER
Text-first threadMessages, media and reactions
Easy to loseVisible in the thread
Reply onlyReply or react
ARCHITECTURE
Accounts and group membership determine who can take part in a conversation.
Messages, replies and reactions are arranged as a readable timeline for the group.
Photos and video travel through the same conversation flow without becoming a separate experience.
The app keeps interaction responsive and gives messages, media and reactions a mobile-first interface.
The product had to make several kinds of interaction feel like one conversation. Text, media and reactions could not compete for separate parts of the interface.
ENGINEERING
NOT PUBLISHED
No engineering article has been published for this experiment yet.
BUSINESS IMPACT
The Android beta launched in September 2016 and gathered 300,000 downloads.
A group-first messenger could give a community a more focused place to converse than a generic social feed.
Observed means measured in a real engagement. Estimated is reasoned from the work but not measured. Potential is what the approach makes possible. Nothing here is dressed up as more than it is.
WHAT FAILED
Group conversation quickly includes photos, video and lightweight responses. A text-only thread makes those interactions feel bolted on and obscures what the group is reacting to.
WHAT CHANGED
The Android experience treated media and reactions as first-class parts of the conversation flow, so a group could share and respond without leaving the thread.
CODE
The beta application was commercial work and its Android source remains private. The design study records the subsequent Amity product direction.
SHARE AND ENJOY
Tell me what's going on. I'll come back within a business day, and if I'm not the right person for it I'll say so.
