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Throwback Thursday: Facebook launches old-school 'Rooms' app

"We don’t want this to be a place where you talk to friends," said creator Josh Miller.

By Brooks Hays
The icon of the new Facebook-funded app Rooms. (Facebook/Rooms)
The icon of the new Facebook-funded app Rooms. (Facebook/Rooms)

SAN FRANCISCO, Oct. 23 (UPI) -- For the generation that came of age on computers in the 1990s and early 2000s, Facebook's new "Rooms" app will feel the anonymous chatrooms of AOL. For jaded Internet users it may seem antiquated or gimmicky. For the more open-minded, it may seem like a slightly sleeker version of Reddit, outfitted for the mobile age.

Regardless of perception, it's further proof that Facebook creator Mark Zuckerberg is willing to take chances on anonymous social mediums.

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The app is intended to allow people to engage with strangers and participate in topic-based discussions -- whether it's old school sneakers, a new video game or hairstyle trends. Users can create chatrooms on their own, and join others via public link or private invite. Unlike the online discussion spaces of the MTV and Michael Jordan era, Rooms will allow for videos and pictures to posted along with text.

"A room is a feed of photos, videos, and text -- not too different from the one you have on Instagram or Facebook -- with a topic determined by whoever created the room," Rooms creator and Facebook project manger Josh Miller wrote in a blog post. "Early users have already created rooms for everything from beat boxing videos to parkour to photos of home-cooked meals."

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To set up an account, users will need to give an email address. But once inside a room, chatters can use any untaken username. Different names can be used for different rooms.

"We don't want this to be a place where you talk to friends," Miller told The New York Times. "There are many people out there that you didn't go to high school with that you want to connect with."

Miller's startup Branch Media was already developing Rooms last year when it was acquired by Facebook.

The unveiling on Rooms comes just a few weeks after Facebook announced the $19 billion acquisition of WhatsApp, a popular cross-platform mobile messaging application.

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