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Snapchat now has more Android users than iOS
Snapchat continues to grow, thanks to an improved Android app and interest in its Spotlight feature.
Snap continues to add new users
After struggling to grow its user base for awhile, Snap has recently managed to make some headway in that mission. Its last earnings report showed the company managed to grow its daily active user (DAU) number seven percent over the quarter prior. From its third-quarter results released today, it appears Snap is continuing to do well. In the last quarter, the company managed to add 7 million users. Today, Snap is reporting that its DAUs have increased by 13 percent from the same period last year, with a total of 210 million users to date.
Adidas made a Snapchat game to drop limited, 8-bit-themed baseball cleats
Adidas is teaming up with Snapchat on a unique way to launch a product. The sportswear giant has created an 8-bit game you can play in Snapchat, called Baseball's Next Level, where you'll have the chance to buy its new 8-bit-themed baseball cleats. Produced in partnership with developer AvatarLabs, Baseball's Next Level is a home run derby, old-school style title that will let you play as some of Adidas' Major League Baseball athletes. That includes Aaron Judge (Yankees), Carlos Correa (Astros), Alex Bregman (Astros), Justin Turner (Dodgers) and Kiké Hernandez (Dodgers), all of whom have their own Adizero or Icon V cleats in the Adidas 8-bit collection, which you can buy directly from the game.
Instagram's Threads is a camera app for sharing with your closest friends
If you want to get a glimpse of Mark Zuckerberg's "privacy-focused" vision for Facebook, then look no further than Instagram's new social app: Threads. This new standalone, camera-first messaging app is an extension of Instagram's Close Friends feature on Stories, which lets you share pictures, videos and more only with groups of people you've carefully selected. As the Facebook CEO has said in recent months, his plan is to take Facebook into an era of "simple, intimate places," where individuals can have a dedicated space for private interactions on its family of apps. And with Threads from Instagram, which launches today on iOS and Android, the company is taking a step in that direction.
Snapchat makes your selfies more animated with new 3D effects
Get ready for your selfies to have a little more pop on Snapchat. Today, the company is introducing 3D Camera Mode, a new feature which lets you take Snaps that can change perspective and appearance as you move your smartphone around. To make this effect happen, Snapchat is taking advantage of Apple's TrueDepth camera system, which the Cupertino firm uses for features such as Face ID and Animojis. Naturally, this means the new 3D Camera Mode only works for Snapchatters with an iPhone X and above, although these three-dimensional Snaps can be viewed by anyone on the app. So, if you have an Android phone, you can enjoy your friends' 3D selfies, you just can't create any of your own.
Snapchat releases political ad spending data ahead of 2020 election
Snapchat joins other social media giants in ramping up transparency efforts ahead of the 2020 US presidential election. The company has released a library of all the political and issue-based ad campaigns it has displayed on its app. The downloadable spreadsheets -- for both 2018 and 2019 -- includes detailed information on who paid for the ads and the demographic they aimed to target.
NFL celebrates 100th season with Snapchat AR Lens that comes to life
The National Football League and Snap have made another augmented reality experience together. In celebration of the NFL's 100th season, which kicks off on September 5th, the companies are unveiling an AR Lens that lets people scan an NFL 100 logo and bring it to life inside the Snapchat app. The feature uses Snap's Marker technology, introduced in 2018, to let people use their Snapchat camera to unlock a special video created by the NFL. After scanning an NFL 100 logo, the video will show historic highlights between the Chicago Bears and Green Bay Packers, the two teams that are playing the first game of the 2019-2020 season next Thursday. And right beneath the video, as pictured above, there's a clock counting down the days, hours and minutes to the beginning of the NFL 100 season.
Snapchat employees reportedly snooped on users with 'SnapLion' tool
A bombshell Motherboard report reveals that employees across several departments at Snapchat can view user location information, saved Snaps, phone numbers and email address through a tool known as SnapLion. It's not clear exactly how widespread abuse of the tool is; a former Snapchat employee quoted in the report said that data access abuse happened a "few times" at the organization.
An AR film explores the worst tech companies could do with your face
I made a beeline for Stealing ur feelings when I entered the Tribeca Film Festival Immersive Arcade last week. Officially, I'll say that my reason for doing so was because it was the most relevant exhibit for Engadget's scope of coverage: This interactive AR short studies what companies like Snap, Facebook and Google are doing (or can do) with the data they have on your facial expressions. But let's be honest, I'm pretty sure I was drawn to it because of the big selfie camera perched over the display.
Snapchat can survive, but it can't do it alone
Snap Inc. co-founder and CEO Evan Spiegel kicked off the first-ever Partner Summit last week in Los Angeles with a sort of syrupy soliloquy about how the Snapchat camera "lets natural light from our world penetrate the darkness of the internet." He went on to say the internet was "started as a military research project" and, therefore, "it's just not our natural habitat." The point Spiegel was trying to make (I think) is that building a platform like the internet is a collaborative process. And he sees Snapchat as a world where good things can happen, but he doesn't want to build it alone.
Snapchat now lets you play live, multiplayer games with friends
Well, it looks as if the rumors were true: Snapchat is, indeed, launching its own gaming platform. Snap made the news official at its Partner Summit, which is taking place in Los Angeles. The company said that, starting today, it will begin rolling out a series of games made exclusively for Snapchat, including one it developed itself called Bitmoji Party. Snap says what makes its games service unique is that each title is designed for "high-fidelity, synchronous" gameplay, meaning you can you play them in real-time with your friends directly through the app.
Snap expands its short-form original series lineup with 10 new shows
It was only last October that Snap entered the short-form, scripted-video space with the launch of Originals, a collection of titles created from the ground up with smartphones in mind. But the company isn't stopping there. Today, at the Snap Partner Summit in Los Angeles, it announced 10 new original shows that are scheduled to arrive starting in May of this year. Like the existing Originals, such as Bringing up Bhabie and The Dead Girls Detective Agency, the fresh series are mostly geared toward teenagers -- a demographic that has become increasingly important to the company's business.
Snapchat Stories are coming to Tinder
Tinder ditched its Moments feature in 2015, but that doesn't mean the popular dating app is done with giving users access to ephemeral (aka disappearing) content. Later this year, those of you on Tinder can start posting Snapchat Stories directly to your dating profile, Snap announced today at its Partner Summit in Los Angeles. Thanks to Snap Kit, which lets third-party apps use Snapchat's augmented reality camera, you'll be able to use send Snaps to a new "My Tinder Story" option right inside the app. That means you'll have to use Snapchat if you want to use this feature, as the Tinder app will only be used for viewing, rather than publishing, your Snaps.
Snapchat 'Landmarkers' bring the Eiffel Tower to life in AR
Snap is kicking off its Partner Summit in Los Angeles with a few announcements about the feature that makes Snapchat tick: augmented reality Lenses. For starters, Lens Studio, which lets anyone create their own AR filters, is getting a new feature called "Landmarkers." This will allow creators to bring landmarks across the world to life using Lens Studio's augmented reality tools, including the US Capitol Building (Washington, D.C.), Flatiron Building (New York City), TCL Chinese Theater (Los Angeles), Buckingham Palace (London) and, as pictured above, the Eiffel Tower (Paris). Snapchat users near any of these locations can check out the new Landmarkers Lenses starting today, and the company says AR support for more landmarks will be coming in the future.
