Facebook was trying to work out a $3 billion deal to purchase Snapchat that just never came to fruition – so what’s a billionaire to do?…he design a competing App to rival the opposition, codenamed Slingshot. Although both of these Apps work very similar, they do have their differences.
Privacy concerns are at an all-time high – people do not want their pictures floating around in cyberspace indefinitely – with kidnappings, stalking, and child porn at an all-time high, little Suzy may look cute in her bathing suit, but do you really want a pedophile viewing and possibly tracking her down via her picture? Snapchat put a stop to those kinds of activities by allowing you to set a timer on the photo before you sent it out to friends – after its ‘time was up,’ the photo would be deleted from Snapchat’s servers and never could be seen again. Reminds me of the ‘Mission Impossible’ TV show…this tape will self-destruct in 10 seconds. The first of May, Snapchat expanded their services and added “Chat” for real-time conversations as well as face-to-face meetings.
Facebook Creative Labs just introduced their version of Snapchat, called Slingshot, and is very much like the original Snapchat, but in different in its own right. When you ‘sling’ a picture or video to your friend(s), before they can view your sent item, they must ‘sling’ something back to you. When your friend ‘slings’ something back to you, they are, in essence, letting the picture or video know that it is them and they have permission to view the sent item. Once you receive and view the item sent, then you can comment on them, share new items, draw or type on the item and send it back – once you receive and item and swipe it away, it is gone for good. You can ‘sling’ your item to one person or a group of people all at once.
Slingshot allows you to wait a while if you are not ready to sling something back right away…look when you want, as they will be available until you swipe them away. Get as creative as you want by adding captions or drawings – the only limit is your imagination. The App is compatible with Android versions of either Jelly Bean or KitKat. Give us a holler on our Google+ Page and ‘sling’ us your opinion on Facebook’s new App, Slingshot – is it really new or different…as always we would love to hear from you.