By Basel Alder, Tutor CLE Monterey
What is Snapchat?
Nowadays, Snapchat is a fun and spunky app that allows users to take pictures and videos and send them to their followers and friends. These images and videos can last up to 10 seconds before they vanish from existence — parents fret not, Snapchat does in fact monitor every snap that is created — with the exception of viewers taking screenshots or replaying these snaps up to once per day. The snap creator is alerted by notification if someone takes a screenshot or replays their snap. While able to send plain snaps, more recently the app was updated to include masks, filters, bitmojis, “Our Story,” and “Current Event Stories.” The app was also updated with the ability to send group snaps.
As for the masks and filters, these are add-ons that users can use with their snaps to spice them up, bring some jingle jolly fun, or scare the skin off their friends. Of course, these are merely examples of snap-themed filters, which come out based on popular films, video games, pop culture, and some holidays. While masks can range from the ever-popular “puppy dog” and the “flower crown,” the app developers seem to enjoy surprising users with new masks and filters such as bunnies, pirates, elegant queens, and even shocker ones that turn a user into a gruesome creature when they lunge at the camera. The downside of these numerous possibilities, however, is the learning curve.
Here is what our resident experts (students) had to say about Snapchat.
The newest addition to the Snapchat family are the randomly placed Snapchat sunglass huts. The Snapchat spectacles cost a whopping $200, and include a charging cable so you can charge your glasses while they sit in their case.
– Kierstin Bohrk
Snapchat is a social media platform. It’s used to quickly and easily share pictures of your everyday life with friends and followers. It’s a bit nicer than Facebook and Instagram because it’s a disposable media platform. The pictures and videos in Snapchat can only be viewed for a certain amount of time—usually a 10 second period. You will also be alerted if someone views your media more than once or if they decide to take screenshot of it. The app always has roughly 15 different filters you can view. Sometimes, the effect of the filter will change depending on whether you use the front or back facing camera. New and old filters get exchanged for each other on a nearly daily basis. While Snapchat is mostly used for chatter and exchanges between friends and followers, some users also send pictures and videos to streams relevant to current events with the option to save those to the users’ Snapchat memories.
– Casey Gerrard
Snapchat is a fun messaging app that allows you to capture a photo or a brief video then add a caption, a doodle, or a filter and send the finished product to your friends. You also have a “story” mode, a 24-hour collection of all your snaps that can be broadcasted either to the world or just your friends. These photos and videos only last a certain amount of time before they are gone forever.
– Masa Yuan
Snapchat is used for filters as well as talking to friends. You can take either pictures or videos to send to friends, and set the expiration time to any number less than 10 seconds. You can add friends from your contact list and they will add you back. You earn trophies too. The Snapchat app has to be updated every once in a while in order to get all new feature releases.
– Hannah Zoll
Snapchat is the college version of Instagram. I don’t use it myself, but I know that most everyone does. I wouldn’t be surprised if Snapchat is now bigger than Facebook.
– Camden Hoeser
