Who needs TV when you have Snapchat?!

There was a time when I was off of Facebook & very much into Twitter & Instagram. Of the not too many accounts I followed, I followed a whole bunch of social media, tech type accounts and was literally in the know every time something new came up.

At the time I also had a blog, which I used as a way of sharing little tid bits on apps i’d be using, photos of places I was visiting, instagramming my food & coffee (as we do…) and sharing words on books i’d read and various food & travel related themes. It was sometime around that time that I kept hearing about Snapchat. I thought, ‘okay, let’s give this a try’, though at the time, Instagram was the best thing that had happened to many, so 5 second photos without much thought or props put into wasn’t quite appealing, but I decided to give it a try anyway. I signed up, had the account for maybe 2 days, didn’t know what to do with it, deleted the app & forgot about it.

Not too long after that happened, Snapchat was all the rage again! This time, Facebook was looking to buy it, but Snapchat wasn’t having it and so Facebook came up with Poke, which hardly poked at Snapchat anyway. So again, I thought, let’s give this a try one more time. Again, a couple days in, I wasn’t too excited about it and stories of how teens were misusing it made its rounds on the internet, turned off by all of it, and Snapchat’s purpose in my life, I once again deleted it & forgot about it, until recently.

Third time’s a charm I suppose…

Feeling internet fatigue, social media fatigue and not being able to enjoy my Instagram experience like I did pre 2012, even though I tried for 2 years after that, I decided Snapchat was just what i’d like: personal, temporary, zero clutter and so I was on Snapchat for the third time.

I must say, it’s been quite enjoyable so far!

There are far more older people on it now, so I don’t feel creeped out using an app which teens are misusing, though they probably still are, I just find that Snapchat demographic is evolving and it’s more encompassing in many ways.

The ‘Discover’ section is something I find quite interesting. The day’s stories in snaps, sure, it would be great to see more mainstream news channels on there, but it’s a start.

For me though, the most amazing part of Snapchat has to be their live events feature. It’s like traveling to a place you’ve never been to, through the eyes of multiple people, local & otherwise. It gives you a sense of a place you don’t see in photos or the media. I recall being excited when my first week back on Snapchat I saw ‘Nairobi’ trending. I was excited to see Nairobi, my home, through the eyes of so many. It was nostalgic and exciting all at once! I wanted to see more! Safaris, our beautiful city, the food, the culture. I’m hoping for more of Nairobi or Kenya in general on there!

Today though, was some kind of spectacular. Their live ‘Mecca’ feed was trending on Twitter, so I went into Snapchat to check it out.

It got me thinking how something so simple as an app, can take you to a place you’ve only seen in photos before & have only heard about from stories people tell you. It’s one thing to hear the stories, and simply another to be part of a real time feed, it’s like living in the moment through technology.

Post-Facebook, Twitter & Instagram, I wondered ‘what’s next?!’, I suppose real time publishing in the new next. It’s a wild idea when you think about it. What’s wilder is that there are people out there who did think about it, that’s genius in itself. I can’t help but ask again, ‘what’s next?!’