At the end of the 20th century, the Internet was in the stage of rapid popularization, and many heavyweight Internet products appeared at that time. 1996, three Israelis, Weisig, Wadi and Goldfinger, established Mirabilis Company, which mainly developed software for people-to-people communication on the Internet.
In the same year when the company was founded, they developed the world's first instant messaging software (chat software) and named it ICQ, that is, "I am looking for you". Through ICQ, users can send messages, chat and transfer files on the Internet.
Mirabilis provides ICQ to users free of charge, and anyone can apply for an ICQ account online and use its functions. Under the free policy, the number of ICQ users increased rapidly, and it broke through 1 10,000 only seven months after its release, becoming the instant messaging software with the largest number of users in the world at that time. 1998, ICQ users exceeded100000. ICQ, which was established less than two years ago, was acquired by AOL at a purchase price of 407 million US dollars. ICQ has thus become one of the fastest companies to create wealth in the history of the Internet.
ICQ is successful because it stands at the cusp of the development of the times, and its appearance is the general trend. The success of ICQ naturally attracts countless imitators, the biggest of which is QQ. 1999, the newly established Tencent Company, led by Ma and Zhang Zhidong, launched the instant messaging software OICQ, which almost copied all the functions of ICQ.
OICQ users grew rapidly, reaching1million in the year of its release. Because the names were too similar, Tencent soon received a lawyer's letter from AOL, ICQ's parent company, asking it to change. After thinking about it, Ma changed his name to QQ. From then on, QQ, the imitator, will far surpass its "teacher" and become one of the most successful softwares in China and even the world.
After ICQ was acquired by AOL, it encountered similar software competition led by Microsoft MSN and Yahoo in the United States and related English-speaking countries. In the end, with the deep binding of MSN and Windows operating system, Yahoo relied on a large number of users, and ICQ gradually lost in the competition.
ICQ was only available in English at first. While the English region is suppressed by MSN and Yahoo, it also gives opportunities for the development of localized instant messaging software in non-English regions. Among them, QQ is the most representative. Later, ICQ launched Chinese service, but it was too late, and the China market was dominated by QQ. In many countries, ICQ has encountered similar situations. In this way, ICQ missed the opportunity of globalization.
The rapid development of ICQ in the early stage is mainly free, and users don't need to spend a penny. But enterprises need to make profits, in which case ICQ is forced to embed too many functions. Even with the integration of many seemingly unrelated functions, ICQ has become bloated, followed by a decline in user experience.
It is understandable to attract users with free functions and then realize them by other means, but there is a limit to everything, and doing it is counterproductive. QQ later made the same mistake, with more and more functions. Even Tencent employees may not fully understand it. It was not until 20 1 1 Tencent launched the mobile simplified version of QQ "WeChat" that it went up a storey still higher.
1998, sold to AOL, ICQ moves frequently, and new versions and new functions appear constantly. In 2005, ICQ cooperated with PCCW Hong Kong to launch the Cantonese version of ICQ 5 and began to enter the Hong Kong market. When the number of users of ICQ decreased due to bloated functions, Singular Company introduced a simplified version of ICQ lite with only the most basic functions. In 20 10, AOL sold ICQ to DST, a Russian investment company, for $65,438+875 million.
ICQ is the founder of the first instant messaging software in the world, which inspired countless imitators later, but it has been unknown. Now the instant messaging market is already dominated by QQ, WeChat, WhatsApp and so on!