Facebook’s focus on the future of communication continues to grow

Facebook doesn't just want to be your social hub, it also wants to be a bigger part of how you communicate in general. Now Facebook's gone a little further with the introduction of a new app, Hello. The introduction of Hello continues a trend Facebook's been exploring for the past couple of years. From the company's 2014 acquistion of WhatsApp, to its purchase of the virtual-reality startup Oculus, or the expansion of its own Facebook Messenger app, many of the company's major moves demonstrate a deep interest in the future of communication via text, voice and video messaging. Not all of them have borne fruit yet. The Oculus Rift, for example, still isn't on the market. Facebook's attempt to catch up to Snapchat, with an app called Slingshot, has gained almost no traction. But the efforts do show where Facebook's interests lie as its core social network ages.

Of course, it faces fierce competition from the likes of Twitter, Google, Skype, Snapchat and many others. It's a crowded space. But Facebook seems happy to just be in the mix for now, with plans to keep experimenting. When talking about messaging, Zuckerberg told analysts that he's happy Facebook has "evolved from a single blue app on your phone into a family of apps" that allow users to talk to each other in a variety of ways. "I think that these are just going to keep on growing, is my expectation and hope," he said, "And we're excited to kind of pursue both different products to serve the different communities."