( CNN ) -- Smartphone owners may have to ask themselves : why text when there 's Facebook Messenger ? That 's a question the cellular carriers will lament as the biggest technology players pile into what 's known as the mobile-messaging space . Facebook joined the fray on Tuesday with the release of Messenger for iPhone and Android . Facebook 's Messages feature , which allows people to communicate privately with friends on the social network and recently with e-mail acquaintances , is already built into the Facebook apps . However , the new standalone Messenger software is a cornerstone for Facebook 's ambition to become the communications hub on phones , Facebook employees working on the messaging product have said in interviews . To design the app , Facebook acquired the development team that built a program called Beluga . It allows users to include photos and location coordinates with each message and can also send text messages to phone numbers , much like the new Facebook app . Andrew Bosworth , a Facebook product director , discussed the potential need for a dedicated client in an March interview , days after the Beluga engineers started at the Palo Alto , California , company . `` One click from the home screen is a valuable trait , '' he said , contrasted with the need to open the full Facebook app in order seek new messages . `` They 've built specifically for mobile-to-mobile . Our messages stuff was built for a convergence between mobile and Web and e-mail and a bunch of other things . '' Bosworth suggested that a standalone messenger was `` the next step '' in Facebook 's plans . As it turns out , it was . But cell operators , which derive substantial profits from texting plans and per-message fees , stand in the way , Bosworth said . How they manage their SMS networks is viewed by tech visionaries as controlled , stifling . ( SMS stands for Short Messaging Service , another name for texting . ) Facebook is made up of people who breathe the hacker ethos . Earlier this summer , for example , Facebook hired George Hotz , aka GeoHot , who hacked iPhone and PlayStation 3 software . Networks should be malleable , these people often say . `` SMS to SMS : those are controlled by the carriers , '' Bosworth said during the interview from March . `` That 's a closed loop . '' Apple , whose founders famously built `` blue box '' equipment decades ago for enabling free phone calls , much to the chagrin of telecom firms , apparently buy into this thinking as well . This fall , Apple will bundle a mobile app called iMessage into iPhone , iPod Touch and iPad , which can bypass cell carrier infrastructure granting free text messages to other users of Apple devices . Similarly , Research in Motion has BlackBerry Messenger . And Google provides two services : Huddles , which is part of the Google+ social network , and Google Voice . A dedicated app can be deployed on , say , your mother 's smartphone in order to ween her off of AT & T 's or Verizon Wireless ' texting services and into a free communication network that uses minute amounts of data . `` To people , it 's a bridge -- like , 'Oh , I already know how this works . This is great , ' '' Bosworth said . These types of apps `` are taking SMS and moving it away from that closed-loop thing and into another space , '' he added . `` This is an area that 's very exciting and hot and interesting , '' Bosworth said . `` I do n't think anyone has the answer yet . I think Facebook Messages is the very likely substrate upon which these things end up operating . '' An AT & T spokesman declined to comment . Verizon has said it intends to eventually move all of its services onto its next-generation 4G LTE data network . The company has n't said how it would price the different features . Software alternatives to texting could pose a threat to existing money makers , but carriers must find or create other worthwhile channels to charge for , Verizon Wireless marketing chief Marni Walden said in an interview in January . `` We 'll always be in a place where we have to evolve how we generate revenue for the business , '' Walden said . `` But we 're not going to run away from the innovation that 's happening out there . We 're going to make sure we innovate it better , or integrate it better on our devices than anyone else , as opposed to putting up a walled garden . '' To that , the technorati might say : LOL .
Facebook released the Messenger app for phones on Tuesday . Facebook executives have talked about the potential for change in the wireless industry . Other technology giants offer similar solutions for phones .