Idea: Display time / distance change between Snapchat Story posts to help show the person’s story (#18)

Context helps with understanding what someone has done in their Stories, particularly if there are many posts throughout the day, including in some cases when this could be clear about how many distinct places are being visited.

View Stories, tap to view Friend 2’s Story, and tap through from one Story to the next while noting the distance and time that passed from the prior Story to the current Story you watch. Designed by D.J. Sherrets.

Snapchat today:

• The Stories page shows when a friend’s most recent Story was posted. There’s no time indication otherwise.
• Stories have location included if a location filter was added by the person.
• Snapchat Live Events let users post to specific places based on your geo location, and those Live Event can be viewed by people nearby and even people anywhere in the world who view the Live Events.

Proposed idea:

1. Tap on “Friend 2” on the Stories view.
2. Tap for next Story. Note the time and location on the bottom showing the first chronologically available post.
3. Tap for next Story. Note the time and distance on the bottom showing what changed from Story #1 to Story #2.
4. Tap for next Story. Note difference #2 to #3.
5. Tap for next Story. Note difference #3 to #4.
6. Tap for next Story. Note difference #4 to #5.
7. Swipe down to return to Stories view.

Comments:

• Enable people to understand the time and distance that passes between each post because time is part of sharing a story.
• Alternatively, text on the bottom of the screen could be simplified from “A few miles away” to “3mi” and “A few hours later” to “3h” or “4h.”
• Consider a version that uses larger font or even centered in the Story to identify the change, though that would probably be too prominently.
• Alternatively, location and/or time could be more or less precise. At least providing some indication of time elapsing.
• A reason to not do this design idea is because time passing is already partly clear from watching Stories based on how much light there is.
• Consider how much people even notice the indication of the text showing distance and time passing, particularly since the focus is probably on watching Stories visually rather than reading text.

View Stories, tap to view Story, tap to next and note Story #2 is “A few miles away” and “An hour later”, then tap for next story…

…and see that this post is nearby to the last Story and soon after when the last Story was posted, then tap for next and see that Story #4 is 30 miles away from Story #3 and posted a few hours later, then tap for next…

…and see that’s a few miles away and 10 hours later, then swipe down to return to Stories view. Designed by D.J. Sherrets.

Note that this shows an alternate version that makes the time ago larger in case that helps with quickly viewing time elapsed while keeping focus on watching the Story. Designed by D.J. Sherrets.

© 2016 D.J. Sherrets