Facebook has announced that it has managed to force 500 million unwilling people to download and use its Messenger app.
The social network launched a separate messaging app, with different functionality to the main Facebook service, in 2011.
But in July, with the app languishing at a mere 200 million users, the social network forced anyone wishing to read their Facebook messages, as well as send videos and make free calls, to download it.
Mark Zuckerberg has since said that forcing people to use it was "a short term painful thing", but said that it allowed the site to be "faster and more focused".
And since then? Predictably, the user base has expanded - to 500 million users.
Facebook celebrated the milestone in a blog post. Peter Martinazzi, Director of Product Management said:
"Messaging is an important part of how people stay connected and since Messenger launched in 2011 we’ve been passionate about giving people a faster and more expressive way to communicate.
Today more than 500 million people are using Messenger each month and we’re more committed than ever to make it the best possible messaging experience... We’ve also continued to improve speed and reliability. Updates to Messenger ship every two weeks so it continues to evolve and improve.
"This is an exciting milestone but with a half billion people relying on Messenger to communicate and connect, it is also a reminder that there is so much left for us to do."
Meanwhile, Messenger has a two-star rating on the App Store.