Misty, water-colored meemmmmemories…
Snapchat just announced they are selectively rolling out a new feature today called Memories that will let you see, sort, and share all your previous snaps because nothing makes sense anymore.
Between this and Facebook’s plans to integrate Snapchat-esque filters into it’s new live video feature, it seems like all the social media companies are trying to prove they can be your one-stop shop for technology-based socializing.
#NeverForget the hotdog you ate 45 days ago
Snapchat made it’s mark on the online social world by offering short, ghost-like messages, video, and pictures that had a built in expiration date for you and whoever you shared them with.
But after this update, which is rolling out over the next couple months, you’ll be able to see all of your old snaps. You can search by keyword like “vacation” or “cat” and you can send these old snaps to your story or to your friends.
Your individual snaps are in little rectangles, while old stories appear as circles with bite-sized previews of the snaps they contain. You can edit them, make new stories, and send them to your friends as well as keep them in a feature they sure aren’t calling anything like a “timeline”.
Privacy features included
If the prospect of all your old snaps appearing in reverse chronological order on your phone is alarming to you, don’t fret. You can easily set snaps to “my eyes only” so you can browse your snaps while sitting next to your friend while drinking bubble tea without worrying they will see something private.
Furthermore, Snapchat was careful to specify that this feature doesn’t change their commitment to privacy.
Your memories are stored by Snapchat but they insist they will not back up anything from your camera unless you make a new story or add it to “my eyes only”.
Why the change?
Why is Snapchat making a dramatic change from it’s previous model? It might be because there’s been an overall decline in the volume of sharing on social media. There’s also speculation about how the in-the-moment sharing that happens on Snapchat creates a feeling of authenticity, so maybe they realize people might want to look back on the moments that had an impact on them.
No matter what caused it, with over 150 million daily users, Snapchat seems to want to capitalize on the fact that it’s becoming the default app-tap for capturing a moment for much of the tech-savvy population.
You’ll get an adorable ghost-themed message from Team Snapchat when the Memories feature is ready for you, which could be anytime in the next 30 days.
