Snapchat Is Going To Put Ads Next To Messages From Friends (theverge.com) 21
Snapchat will soon start "experimenting" with placing sponsored messages next to chat threads from friends, according to CEO Evan Spiegel. From a report: These "Sponsored Snaps" from brands will appear as unread messages in Snapchat's main Chat tab, implying that they'll sit above messages from a person's contacts until they're acted on. This is the first time Snap will show ads in the most used part of its app. In an employee memo also posted on the company's website, Spiegel says that Sponsored Snaps will appear âoewithout a push notification, and opening the message is optional." It's unclear how easy it will be to get rid of a Sponsored Snap without opening it, or if doing so will even be possible.
"Sponsored Snaps empower advertisers to communicate visually with the Snapchat community, making the core functionality of Snapchat accessible to advertisers," writes Spiegel, who goes on to note that, "As always, your conversations with friends are private and are not used for advertising purposes."
"Sponsored Snaps empower advertisers to communicate visually with the Snapchat community, making the core functionality of Snapchat accessible to advertisers," writes Spiegel, who goes on to note that, "As always, your conversations with friends are private and are not used for advertising purposes."
In other words ... (Score:2)
Sponsored Snaps empower advertisers to communicate visually with the Snapchat community, ...
This allows us to make money off you by allowing spam on the main tab ...
It's unclear how easy it will be to get rid of a Sponsored Snap without opening it, or if doing so will even be possible.
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It's actually pretty clear how easy it will be to get rid of Sponsored Snaps: Use one of the other dozen free messaging tools that don't do this shit.
Snapchat thinks their application is special. It's not.
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IRC > ICQ > MSN > MySpace > Facebook > Whats App > Snapchat >
What's next in the long line of Internet messaging kings?
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Do you have another proposal for how they could make money? I mean, they're a commercial business, and you're using their product for free. When their product is free to use, that means *you* are the product.
We all complain about this, but every single time a company has tried to ask for a subscription fee to use their service ad-free, guess what people do! They refuse to sign up, or they opt for the free ad-supported tier. Only a very few will actually cough up the money to get an ad-free experience. And t
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I remember when WhatsApp first came out, they charge maybe £2 a year (payable by phone bill via SMS) and that was it. No-one I knew couldn't afford that and didn't much mind...
A messaging app with millions or billions of users can probably make a tidy profit on, say, £10 or even £5 a year and the vast majority of users could afford it.
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If no one minded paying for WhatsApp, why is it free today?
The fact is, the cost introduced enough friction that people chose other free messaging services instead.
It doesn't matter if it's "possible" to make money on $5 or $10 a year, if people choose other free services because they are...free.
We need more money! NOW. (Score:2)
The way "the system" is set up these days, every niche-dominating corporate cancer remains in a desperate and never-ending struggle to get more money. And if'n they don't get it, then the company gets destroyed. Various paths to death. Change of opinion about the "value" of the company's stock? Acquisition by a competitor? Insanity of the CEO? Or the case that might apply here is a perverse economic model that drives the company's products into a crazy rabbit hole.
But as regards Snapchat I think the story s
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Just one more ad (Score:2)
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It'll still be usable (Score:2)
If the ads are clearly put there as ads and can be ignored, they'll live for another day. If they ever force users to view an ad before viewing snaps from friends, that'll be the end of them.
Enshitification (Score:3)
Level 1 - Complete.
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A little more on this..
Level 1 complete, level 2 experimentation is now beginning.
Enshitification: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
A new example for Cory Doctorow's upcoming talks (Score:2)
There seems to be no shortage of companies proving him right.
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I haven't been following Doctorow closely these years. Can you clarify the theme of the talks?
Story mostly notable for lack of interest on the Slashdot side. And resulting lack of Funny?
Open-Source, Please Step Up (Score:2)
"..are not used for advertising purposes." (Score:2)