Messages Aloud reads your Facebook messages aloud so that you can stay connected with your friends anytime, anywhere. It is part of VoiZapp's Aloud series of reading aloud apps that also includes Friends Aloud, Tweets Aloud, Read It Aloud, and (soon) Emails Aloud.

How does the Lite (Free) version work?
Messages Aloud Lite is designed to be a free introduction to VoiZapp's reading aloud technology. After logging into your Facebook account, you may choose to mute any of your friends. When you tap "Read Aloud Now," the latest 10 messages from your Facebook messages inbox will be retrieved and read aloud to you. Reading aloud is controlled by iPod-like controls at the bottom of the screen. At any time, and as often as you wish, you may tap the refresh button in the upper right-hand corner to retrieve & read the latest 10 messages. You may also tap on any displayed message to jump there, and flick the screen up/down to view other posts, even as others are being read aloud. A banner ad may be displayed just above the iPod controls, and after the latest 10 messages have been read aloud, an alert will pop up asking you to purchase Messages Aloud Pro.

What do I get if I pay for the Pro version?
The Pro version extends the Lite version as follows:

• It imports and reads aloud an initial group of the latest unread messages.
• After all unread messages have been read, or whenever you tap the refresh button, it will automatically start reading aloud only new incoming messages as they arrive for as long as you wish. To return to reading down all messages displayed in sequence, even if they have already been read aloud, tap on any specific message.
  
• It will continue reading down the list of displayed messages in the background while you use your iOS device for other tasks.
• It does not display advertisements or pop up an alert box at the end.

How do I switch between reading only new messages and reading all messages displayed in the Pro version?
To read new messages only, tap the refresh button in the upper righthand corner of the Messages screen. To read all messages, tap on any displayed message to start reading aloud from there down the entire list.

Messages Aloud sometimes reads aloud recent messages that I have already read visually inside Facebook.
The official Facebook Application Programming Interface (API) does not tell Messages Aloud which messages are marked unread vs. read. Thus, Messages Aloud can only "know" which messages are already read if it reads them itself. It considers all recent messages to be unread until that happens. Also, because of the same API limitation, it cannot change the read vs. unread marker on your Facebook account.

How long will the Pro version keep reading messages aloud?
If the app is kept in the foreground, it will read messages aloud as they arrive in your Facebook messages inbox for as long as your battery lasts. If sent to the background, it will continue reading all displayed messages aloud, but because of a limitation of Apple's iOS multitasking, it cannot automatically retrieve new messages from there. So if you want to check for and continue reading messages, you must tap its icon to bring it to the foreground and refresh its list of messages to be read from time to time. You can always send it to the background once again and it will continue reading aloud.

Please report any problems or make suggestions by emailing support@voizapp.com. Your feedback will make Messages Aloud even better!