My Discovery of Snapchat

I’m not the most charismatic person in the world, and I’m by no means entertaining or interesting. I’m also not a 15 year old girl (I was born in 1985, and I’m a dude). But there is something about that little ghost that just makes me happy.

I first downloaded Snapchat in early 2014 because I had been hearing a lot about it. I figured that, if Facebook was willing to shell out more cash than I will ever see in my life, I should at least check it out.

I downloaded it, tried to figure out what all those icons meant. I freaked out that I might accidentally send a picture of the wall to everyone in my contacts or worse yet, send them all an invitation (seriously, who does that??). A week later, I forgot all about it and deleted it.

Fast forward to around Thanksgiving time. I felt like I was hearing more and more people talk about it. My curiosity was spiked and I decided to download it again and give the ol’ college try.

Soon, I ran across the same problem most people struggle with upon opening ‘er up. The conversation I had with myself went a little something like this:

What am I supposed to do with this? Take selfies? I don’t do selfies (that much). I don’t even know which of my friends use this thing. How do I find people? There’s no search feature? I am NOT inviting all my contacts. Ohhhh I get it, you swipe left and right to get to different stuff. I’m really lame because apparently I have no friends.

I turned to my favorite social platform of all time (Twitter) and searched “Snapchat.” Then I saw a recommended search “Snapchat add me.” Don’t do that. Not only did I see pictures I didn’t want to see, but my confidence in the male race is still recovering after what I read there.

Then I saw something about a “Snapchat Story” and went down that rabbit hole.

Hey this is really cool! So that little plus button on the camera screen adds to the story. Who’s this Casey Neistat guy? Wow, this is really cool! So I can just add stuff to my story all day? And I can’t upload anything from my camera roll? So that means that the stuff people add to their story is all genuine and not all fancy with editing and stuff? Wow. There might be something to this.

I started searching “Snapchat” on Twitter, but filtering to just the people that I follow. I found out there are like a dozen of them that use Snapchat on a daily basis uploading stories.

After following a bunch of people, I started realizing that Snapchat has quickly risen to be one of my favorite social media platforms.

But why? What’s the appeal?

Snapchat forces you to be genuine and creative. It’s not about vanity numbers, it’s about an interaction.

So here I am. I check Snapchat on a daily basis. I get inspired to add to my story all the time, sharing my life with people who want to see it. It’s amazing to me how this platform has become habitual for me.

To me, the beauty of Snapchat is that it seems real. You only talk with people you know. No auto-follow bots. No paid followers. Just the people that have to know you enough to spell your username correctly.

Not everyone feels my excitement though.

The Age Gap

While scanning my other social platforms for people I knew that were using Snapchat, I also started talking about it. I started asking some people if they used it or not. I found a distinctive age gap in users.

The majority of my connections and friends that did not use it all seemed to be over the age of 30. There were a few exceptions, sure, but that was that vast majority. Those anomalies that were over 30 had a very youthful outlook on life and were deep in the trenches of understanding millenials. Everyone else older than me just wrote it off as either a sexting app or a waste of time.

Seriously? A waste of time? You’re diddling around on Facebook talking about Snapchat being a waste of time? I love you guys, but come on. Just about everything we do online can be looked at as a “waste of time.” Efficiency and time management are not the focus of 95% of what we do in life.

Have You Actually Tried It?

I run in a lot of social media and tech-minded circles online. You would think that one of the fastest rising social media platforms would garner a large audience from these folks who are always looking for the next great thing to try and make a few bucks.

Nope.

With all those Gen Xers and older that I saw bemoaning Snapchat as dumb, pointless, all about sexting, and not worth learning seemed to share something in common… most of them had never actually used it!

First off, who in their right mind can form an opinion of something and dig their heels in so deep without having actually given it a whirl??

Secondly… well, there is no secondly. What the crap? If you haven’t tried it, then you don’t get an opinion. Isn’t that what all you people tell us about voting?

Here’s the thing. I expect this kind of reaction from your average adult. That’s half the reason my generation (and younger) like it so much. There is a real freedom from the “old folks” on Snapchat. But these are people who make a living utilizing and perfecting best practices on social media platforms. They know better than to dismiss something they haven’t even tried.

Is the Absence of Adults Good or Bad for Snapchat?

Not really. I’m sure there will be some adults who trickle onto the platform eventually. For now, I guess it will remain somewhat “pure.”

Ok. I literally giggled when I typed that, given Snapchat’s naughty history.

But you know what I mean — it isn’t likely to be ruined by marketers anytime soon, and your mom can’t get on there and share a hundred icanhascheezeburger memes from 5 years ago like some other places we know.

Honestly, who cares. At this point, it’s very enjoyable. If you want to be a responsible adult and dismiss “those darned kids and their Mickey Mouse apps” then go right ahead. We won’t miss you.

Update: If you are intimidated by Snapchat, I have since written a “how to” for getting started. Take a look here.

If you’re reading this, thanks for taking the time and making it this far. Now I would love to hear what your thoughts are about Snapchat. Which category do you fall into? Tweet me at @figoamericano. If you do happen to use it, snap me at figoamericano.

As always, I would truly appreciate you hitting the recommend button. Seriously. Just click it. That’s all I’m asking. Don’t be a punk.