Remember the days when Snapchat was simply just for sharing photos and videos? And there were no ads or stories being pushed down your throat? And you could actually find your friend’s list? Oh, those were the days. Recently, Snapchat released its new update and people are not having it. Through Snapchat’s support website, they said, “We hope to make it easier to stay in touch with your friends, discover exciting new content from around the world, and just use the app in general!” Well, sorry to burst your bubble, but it is far from that!
A multitude of users is complaining through other forms of social media, trying to get Snapchat to change back. A petition created on Change.org named “Remove the new Snapchat update” has been signed by nearly 800,000 people. Other petitions show screenshots of people messaging the creators of the app, petitioning if they get a certain number of likes, shares, retweets, etc., that Snap should change back to the original design. So far, it’s hard to say if these sources are true, as these days faking a direct message thread is easier than you think.
Some of the most frustrating part that users are encountering is being able to view stories. With the new update, people’s stories are no longer in chronological order (come on Snapchat, didn’t you learn anything from Instagram). It is increasingly difficult to watch people’s stories you care to see and causes for what seems to be never-ending scrolling to find them. It’s even difficult to find your own story! What used to be a simple switch of screens is now several clicks and confusion just to see what you posted.
Courtesy: Elite Daily
Another frustrating thing about the update is the separation between friend’s stories and celebrities’ or other accounts you follow. These all used to be in one section, but now they’re separated. Along with the disorganization, there is an increase of ads or stories from magazines and other publications mashed in with these. In the prior design, you could scroll past them if you wanted. In the new design, they are incorporated with famous Snapchat accounts, and it makes it significantly harder to view what you want. Nobody likes ads being shoved down their throat, but, unfortunately, this seems like the new norm.
I’d have to say the only thing people seem to like about this new update is you can change the text to different fonts on pictures you share, from rainbow to glow text and a variety of others. They also upgraded the Bitmoji app, so now they can be edited to look even more like you than before. While these two features are great, couldn’t they have just added these parts and kept everything else the same? While users are trying to get used to the new update, there are no signs so far of Snapchat changing back. Hopefully, they’re seeing what their users are saying and planning a fix.