Viber, the popular cross-platform communication service, announced a new feature to stay ahead of its game in the highly competitive market. Public Chats, Viber's new feature gives its users the right to tune into a live conversation between their favorite personalities and others. In simple words, the new feature is a way for celebs to broadcast their conversations with others.
While the new feature allows its millions of users to read celebs' messages, Public Chats will not let them chat with celebs directly. To kick off the new feature, Viber will broadcast conversations from popular personalities like blogger Perez Hilton, D.J. Paul van Dyk, YouTube sensation Tyler Oakley, singer-songwriter Pixie Lott, the European football channel COPA90 and the Next Model Management modeling agency.
"Connect with your favorite personalities and be part of their conversations. Get the inside scoop whether it's music, movie stars, sports, food, celebrity gossip or anything else you're into," the company said explaining the new feature on its website.
Viber's new feature also has certain limitations. According to the company, users will be able to listen in to the conversations only if the account in conversation is in their contacts. To listen to public chats, users can access the Public Chats bar from the main menu and browse through a list of available conversations to follow.
According to the company's CEO Talmon Marco, Public Chats does not replace the app's core messaging function but is offered as an additional feature, the N.Y. Times reported. In fact, Marco assured its users that the new addition will not attract ads in order to consume revenue.
Viber's Public Chats is currently being rolled out to Android users and other platforms will get the new feature at a later time. With nearly 460 million users, Viber is taking its battle against giants like WhatsApp and WeChat, each of which hosts over 600 million users.
Viber is available as a free download for various platforms, including Android, iOS, Windows for PC, Windows 8, Windows Phone, BlackBerry and Nokia.
