alt Hacker News> If WhatsApp went down without a long transition process first
The transition mechanism is that your contacts are in your phone address book, and you can call or text them or find them on other platforms indexed by phone number. Although, not for username contacts.
Would it be disruptive? Yes. Would it be world ending? No.
That is all well and good for individuals chatting with family, friends or small groups. But alot of small businesses all over the world are using WhatsApp for Business with features and data storage that cannot be immediately moved to another platform. If it disappeared tomorrow, you would see business failures and immediate economic impact in developing-world regions that can hardly afford such a hit.