Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Introducing the new Snapchat

snap.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

121–130 of 212 posts

Re: Introducing the new Snapchat

#121

Post by austincheney »

iambateman wrote: post #48

Evan of Snapchat talks about “performing for your friends” as a strange “side effect” of Snapchat. But the instinct to perform is native to the Snapchat medium. I think this is a problem. I went to a concert a few weeks ago. The people beside me would stand still for 10 minutes and then someone would pull out Snapchat. The whole group would turn around, flash a smile and start dancing for the camera. 9 seconds later,…

> I went to a concert a few weeks ago. The people beside me would stand still for 10 minutes and then someone would pull out Snapchat. The whole group would turn around, flash a smile and start dancing for the camera. 9 seconds later, they were back to watching the concert.

Out of curiosity are you and your friends younger than 25? I don't know of anybody in my age demographic that would behave like that.

Re: Introducing the new Snapchat

#122

Post by kccqzy »

bhauer wrote: post #93
distantsounds wrote: post #6

Android's Camera API has existed for _literally years_ to take high-quality photos and these guys are still just taking a screenshot of the viewfinder and calling it a day. It's been like this forever and Snap has refused to fix this. I have yet to come across any other app on Android that utilizes the camera this way. The photos are complete garbage. And here they are, trying to add more 'features' into an app where…

The apparent delight in low-quality photography that pervades both Snapchat and Instagram are among the reasons I don't bother using either. Earlier photography applications and platforms such as Flickr celebrated high-quality camera equipment and the resulting photographs. Intentional dramatic down-sampling and filters that add vintage discoloration have never resonated with my senses.

Instagram is a very diverse place, much more so than Snapchat. If you follow the right people, you will basically only see high-quality photos (likely taken from high-end camera equipment too!), but if you just follow your “friends” et al you are gonna be disappointed.

Re: Introducing the new Snapchat

#123

Post by Govannon »

gallerdude wrote: post #78
iambateman wrote: post #48

Evan of Snapchat talks about “performing for your friends” as a strange “side effect” of Snapchat. But the instinct to perform is native to the Snapchat medium. I think this is a problem. I went to a concert a few weeks ago. The people beside me would stand still for 10 minutes and then someone would pull out Snapchat. The whole group would turn around, flash a smile and start dancing for the camera. 9 seconds later,…

I don’t know, isn’t this the same as all social media? I remember reading something along the lines that playing golf is posted on Facebook twice as much as doing the dishes, yet people spend 5x more time doing the dishes. And if we step back from social media, what about regular pictures? They’re supposed to take candid moments of the real world, but even if we’re having a bad day, we smile and act happy for picture…

>what about regular pictures? They’re supposed to take candid moments of the real world

I'm not sure that is an accurate representation of photography as a medium, nor has it ever been.

Re: Introducing the new Snapchat

#124

Post by Apocryphon »

finnh wrote: post #117
anant90 wrote: post #35

Teenagers, and for that matter, everyone yearns for smaller private spaces where they can share whatever they want with their closest friends — without any reservations of judgement from their parents, grandmas or uncles. I used to love Instagram, until Facebook decided to make it Facebook v2 by making my entire "friend" list follow me there as well. That means that until I invest a lot of time hiding my story from e…

This is a great post to read in comparison with iambateman's [0]. You prefer Snapchat because it is a space where you are safe to be yourself, without worrying about parents/uncles/etc seeing you. But iambateman's point is that making videos for our friends is a performative event, and thus drives one to (a) be different from your actual self (more funny/interesting/alive) or, at the very least, to (b) act as you see…

And yet another angle- maybe the urge to perform can be a way in which the medium encourages creativity, not unlike the dearly departed Vine.

Re: Introducing the new Snapchat

#126

Post by Kroniker »

austincheney wrote: post #121
iambateman wrote: post #48

Evan of Snapchat talks about “performing for your friends” as a strange “side effect” of Snapchat. But the instinct to perform is native to the Snapchat medium. I think this is a problem. I went to a concert a few weeks ago. The people beside me would stand still for 10 minutes and then someone would pull out Snapchat. The whole group would turn around, flash a smile and start dancing for the camera. 9 seconds later,…

> I went to a concert a few weeks ago. The people beside me would stand still for 10 minutes and then someone would pull out Snapchat. The whole group would turn around, flash a smile and start dancing for the camera. 9 seconds later, they were back to watching the concert. Out of curiosity are you and your friends younger than 25? I don't know of anybody in my age demographic that would behave like that.

I'm in that age bracket and go to concerts with people in the age bracket. Never seen this behavior in my life. Not even at a shoegaze show!

Re: Introducing the new Snapchat

#127

Post by tartuffe78 »

clw8 wrote: post #95
mbzi wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This^ I have made countless cross-platform AR apps for mobile and desktop. Never an issue with WebRTC/getUserMedia, iOS, windows, etc. However Android is always a nasty problem. From incorrect aspect resolutions, image stretching, silent fails. Each device needs a custom fix which is time consuming and costly. No wonder why Snapchat went an alternative route.

Are time-consuming custom fixes still commonly required in other (not camera reliant) Android apps too? I haven't really done any Android development since I had a Galaxy phone four years ago because this problem really turned me off to making hobby apps for Android.

The camera & low-level video encoding / decoding are the most device-specific quirky in my experience. If you're making something that is just "software" it's all pretty standardized, but when you start accessing the "hardware" (video codec, camera, possibly low-level audio) is where the device specific differences catch you.

Re: Introducing the new Snapchat

#128

Post by anant90 »

finnh wrote: post #117
anant90 wrote: post #35

Teenagers, and for that matter, everyone yearns for smaller private spaces where they can share whatever they want with their closest friends — without any reservations of judgement from their parents, grandmas or uncles. I used to love Instagram, until Facebook decided to make it Facebook v2 by making my entire "friend" list follow me there as well. That means that until I invest a lot of time hiding my story from e…

This is a great post to read in comparison with iambateman's [0]. You prefer Snapchat because it is a space where you are safe to be yourself, without worrying about parents/uncles/etc seeing you. But iambateman's point is that making videos for our friends is a performative event, and thus drives one to (a) be different from your actual self (more funny/interesting/alive) or, at the very least, to (b) act as you see…

I totally see iambateman's point, and agree with it. As far as inauthenticity goes, I would say that it pervades all aspects of our lives, including real-life interactions, which we can assume to be most authentic, yet at some level inauthentic (almost everyone changes themselves a bit depending on who they're talking to).

On this spectrum, the Snapchat experience is a lot more authentic and closer to real-life interactions than Instagram/Facebook, which are a lot worse multipliers of inauthenticity.

Re: Introducing the new Snapchat

#129

Post by cocktailpeanuts »

Kroniker wrote: post #126
austincheney wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I went to a concert a few weeks ago. The people beside me would stand still for 10 minutes and then someone would pull out Snapchat. The whole group would turn around, flash a smile and start dancing for the camera. 9 seconds later, they were back to watching the concert. Out of curiosity are you and your friends younger than 25? I don't know of anybody in my age demographic that would behave like that.

I'm in that age bracket and go to concerts with people in the age bracket. Never seen this behavior in my life. Not even at a shoegaze show!

I'm surprised that you've never seen this behavior. Just go to the nearest nightclub on the weekends and find a group that's doing a bachelorette party or birthday party or something. I see it ALL the time.

Re: Introducing the new Snapchat

#130

Post by smogcutter »

iambateman wrote: post #48

Evan of Snapchat talks about “performing for your friends” as a strange “side effect” of Snapchat. But the instinct to perform is native to the Snapchat medium. I think this is a problem. I went to a concert a few weeks ago. The people beside me would stand still for 10 minutes and then someone would pull out Snapchat. The whole group would turn around, flash a smile and start dancing for the camera. 9 seconds later,…

See also: places and "experiences" (including major contemporary art) meant to be a background for instagram and snapchat https://www.theringer.com/tech/2017/8/9/16110424/instagram-p... (don't let the Ringer url fool you, very good article)
Post reply on HN