In an effort to pose a threat to Snapchat, Facebook will soon launch its Stories feature, allowing users to share photos and videos that leave a user’s feed after they are seen.
Stories can be published on the News Feed and it will include camera effects, frames, masks, edits, and much more, similar to the features available on both Instagram and Snapchat. Reviewers point out that the decision consists in a bold move to try and take down Snapchat as the primary competitor in image-based social media. This could be achieved by making features obsolete or dated, by allowing Facebook and Instagram to employ the same features that Snapchat supports.
Facebook joins the bandwagon while Snapchat goes for the future
The content uploaded as Stories will be available for 24 hours before it disappears. The feature is undergoing a test period in Ireland only, although it is expected to expand to other countries within the next months.
A statement from Facebook reads that people are sharing content in different ways, basing themselves primarily on visual content rather than written or auditive media. Although this is true, Snapchat is known as the pioneer for the feature, implementing it first four years ago and having it copied by Instagram last year.
“Facebook has long been the place to share with friends and family, but the way that people share is changing in significant ways. The way people share today is different than five or even two years ago–it’s much more visual, with more photos and videos than ever before. We want to make it fast and fun for people to share creative and expressive photos and videos with whoever they want, whenever they want,” reads the statement from the social media giant, according to AdWeek.
Mimicking Snapchat’s features, Facebook also implemented camera filters and stickers for Messenger, although users claim that the masks are not as good as Snapchat’s Lenses, which are 20 in total. App and social media analysts are unsure about whether Snapchat’s user base will remain loyal, seeing that Facebook could easily implement more advanced features, and even reactive camera filters, which would allow users to push objects that appear on the screen.
The key about who has the lead in the field appears to be Snapchat’s Spectacles, which would be the company’s first project based on hardware. Spectacles will allow the wearer to capture its surroundings without taking out their phone. Snap Inc. CEO Evan Spiegel argues that the idea is to capture the moment, seeing that the phone poses as a barrier between the moment itself and the person.
“We were walking through the woods, stepping over logs, looking up at the beautiful trees. And when I got the footage back and watched it, I could see my own memory, through my own eyes. It was unbelievable. It’s one thing to see images of an experience you had, but it’s another thing to have an experience of the experience. It was the closest I’d ever come to feeling like I was there again,” he stated to the Wall Street Journal.
On a similar note, Facebook’s Zuckerberg also appears to be focusing on VR to become the next step in the evolution of social networking. It is a matter of time until real-life experiences can be shared on Facebook and Snapchat, allowing others to relive such moments just by tapping them on their screen and projecting them to a VR headset.
Source: Social Media Today