Has the text messaging era come to an end?
When texting at the dinner table was deemed to be rude, who would have thought posing for a “selfie” while biting into a burger would become the next biggest fad? Well, today the world of communicating has escalated to a whole other level.
While many people are still getting the hang of texting on the Iphone, people around the world are “snapping” pictures of themselves to friends in lieu of a text. Thus, creating a much more intimate way of communicating with one another. Rather than adding an emojicon to a text in order to convey emotions, Snapchat is able to express the physicality of communication through photos. Being able to share a specific moment face-to-face with someone across the country adds character and familiarity to communication, when text messages do not.
Even though critics argue that Snapchat is an erasable form of social media, Snapchat CEO Evan Spiegel clarifies that Snapchat is “just like a sentence you share while chatting with a friend at a bar or that smile you flash at your date while walking down the street, Snapchat is about experiencing the moment”. The up to 10-second photo gives the receiver enough time to connect with the message that the sender is trying to deliver. Speigel refers to selfies as self-portraits and that they “are arguably the most popular form of self-expression”.
With Instagram perfecting photos before being posted, Snapchat brings authenticity and personality into the digital media world. “The selfie makes sense as the fundamental unit of communication on Snapchat because it marks the transition between digital media as self-expression and digital media as communication,” says Spiegel.
So, living in a generation embedded deep in social media, lures a more intimate form of communication like Snapchat. The constant connectivity that Snapchat exudes, exemplifies the productivity within the digital communication world.
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