A few hours ago Facebook made an announcement via Facebook News Room, about Facebook Lite. The announcement reads;
By Vijay Shankar, Product Manager for Facebook Lite
Today we’re introducing Facebook Lite, a new version of Facebook for Android that uses less data and works well across all network conditions.
More than a billion people around the world access Facebook from a range of mobile devices on varying networks. In many areas, networks can be slow and not able to support all the functionality found in Facebook for Android. Facebook Lite was built for these situations, giving people a reliable Facebook experience when bandwidth is at a minimum.
Facebook Lite is less than 1MB so it is fast to install and quick to load. It includes Facebook’s core experiences like News Feed, status updates, photos, notifications and more.
Starting today, we are rolling out Facebook Lite in countries across Asia, and over the coming weeks Facebook Lite will be available in parts of Latin America, Africa and Europe.
I thought that probably Kenya should be one of the countries that had the Facebook Lite tested but I was wrong. I searched for the App via my standard Android phones but I couldn’t get it in the Play Store. When I searched for it via the web, I got an error stating that the App is incompatible with all of my devices, which means the App is yet to be available in Kenya.
However, when I went through the screen shots that you can download from the Facebook Newsroom linked to earlier, you’ll realize that with Facebook Lite you will be able to access basically the core functions of Facebook. You will be able to access your News Feed, post your crazy “what’s in your mind” status updates, view photos, message your friends and strangers and do a lot of the other nonsense you normally do on Facebook.
With those provided in the less than 1 MB App, I would professionally advise you to ditch the over 40 MB bloated Facebook App. Not only is the fully fledged Facebook App a memory and battery consumer that has been draining one of my my phone’s battery in less than four hours, but it also doesn’t allow you to chat within the App unless you have downloaded another redundant memory consuming App, the Facebook Messenger.
Once the Facebook Lite arrives, trust me, you will lose nothing by ditching the good for nothing memory and battery draining bloated fully fledged Facebook App.
Good radiance.
