Recently, Snapchat has gotten that little bit better and finally put the ‘chat’ into ‘Snapchat’ by adding instant messaging to the app as well as video calling. Millions of people have been using the service for the past of couple of years and it’s clear that there’s real value there, after all why would Facebook bid $3 Billion for the app? We all know that Facebook’s bid for Snapchat – among others – was refused and that Snapchat decided to go it alone. That doesn’t seem to have hurt the company, as the app just keeps on getting better and better, this might be worrying Facebook as it’s now rumored that the company is looking to introduce their own ‘Snapchat’.
According to a rumor from the Financial Times, Mark Zuckerburg himself is watching over a project dubbed ‘Slingshot’ in house and that it’ll be available as a standalone app. ‘Slingshot’ will feature the same sort of ephemeral messaging that Snapchat made famous, while also being super-simple to share photos and videos in just a few taps. With WhatsApp already under their wing, a Snapchat alternative with video calling would make Facebook even more dangerous than they already are, and if Zuckerburg can hammer home better security – something that Snapchat has struggled with as of late – then their competing product could very well take off.
Recently, Facebook has been delivering a cleaner, leaner mobile experience by unbundling big parts of the app into other apps. Thus giving users the choice of whether or not to use them, while focusing on a tighter core experience. I’ve noticed this myself with the Facebook app and I can see that it’s gotten a lot better to use, with far less clutter getting in the way. With Snapchat being used with teens in ever growing numbers, Facebook will be looking to tap that demographic, for whom mobile is everything. Let’s just hope they do a better job than they did with Poke.