Released five years ago, Snapchat’s main aim was to send pictures to friends that are only available for a maximum of 10 seconds. In 2013, Snapchat Stories was introduced, the feature that took the world by storm because users could post stories that would last under their names for 24 hours. Three years later, Instagram decided to launch Instagram Stories, pretty similar to those of Snapchat but on a different platform.
Despite the similarity between the two features and the applications being related to pictures and videos, users would still upload their stories on both platforms. Undeniably, the features are very helpful in the field of marketing, between vloggers/youtubers and people who make fortunes off of the internet. However this, and other contributing factors have led to the increase of Internet Addiction Disorder (IAD), an impulse control disorder that is limited to virtual communities and has several signs like excessive thoughts about your activity online, and finding it hard to decrease one’s online activity, those signs which could be factors of developing other types of addiction.
Most recently, Whatsapp introduced Whatsapp Status, a feature similar to stories, but on an application mainly made for texting. The written status is no longer there, instead, you can add a photo or a video that will only appear for 24 hours. Familiar much? It’s almost like Snapchat is this one person everybody wants to be like. As if we weren’t surrounded by enough disappearing stories?
The internet is a gateway to better communication, or worse. Everyone has the choice of how, and why, to use the internet and its different platforms. Some people might feel connected by using those ‘stories’, others might feel disconnected and that they’re being less of human beings. It depends on where you stand.
Comments are closed.