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Snapchat Petition Attracts One Million Signatures (bbc.com)

One million people have signed a petition calling on Snapchat to roll back its latest redesign. From a report: The changes were intended to separate interactions with friends from branded content -- including that of celebrities and influencers. Snapchat founder Evan Spiegel wrote in a blog post that he believed blurring the two had contributed to the rise of fake news. However, thousands of Snapchat users say that the new layout is hard to use. Nic Rumsey, who set up the petition, wrote that some are using Virtual Private Network (VPN) apps -- which use servers abroad to mask the location of a device -- in order to access the older version of the platform: "That's how annoying this update has become," he said. "Many 'new features' are useless or defeat the original purposes Snapchat has had for the past years." The petition, posted on the change.org website, is one of several appealing to Snapchat to revert to its previous state.

51 comments

  1. Protocols not apps! by TheRaven64 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    When you have a single implementation of a protocol, some people are always going to hate it. When you have an open protocol with multiple client implementations, you can choose the UI that you like. I wish organisations like the EFF and FSF would spend a bit more of their marketing budget educating the general public on this. If there's only one implementation, particularly if it's closed source, then you're at the whims of whoever is responsible for it.

    --
    I am TheRaven on Soylent News
    1. Re:Protocols not apps! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You realize snapchat is an *advertising gimmick*, right?

    2. Re:Protocols not apps! by Octorian · · Score: 1

      Unfortunately, in the modern smartphone world, this is far easier said than done. Many products depend on back-end infrastructure integration that cannot be so easily opened up (e.g. push services, API tokens, etc.). Also, many products depend on expected behaviors of other apps using the product, and open implementations can easily violate these expectations (or be way behind in supporting any protocol changes).

    3. Re:Protocols not apps! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Uhm, that's great for a paid service. But snapchat isn't paid. The only way to make massive amounts of money for chat programs seems to be to sell emojis or advertisements. Protocols can't force users to see propaganda.

    4. Re: Protocols not apps! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Snapchat? Does anyone still use that? You might as well be using MySpace or IRC or something....

      Fond memories thought :)

    5. Re:Protocols not apps! by Voyager529 · · Score: 1

      I completely agree with you - the web as we know it wouldn't exist if HTTP, SMTP, and TCP/IP were some vertical thing that only one company could produce.

      The problem is twofold: First off, protocols don't make anyone money. I sincerely doubt the teams who wrote SIP or SSH are millionaires, even though their protocols make the world go round. Even the altruistic folks willing to write such a protocol need to pay the bills.

      Second, making an open protocol and then trying to make money off a first party implementation is basically opening the door to competing with one's self. If Snapchat was a protocol, Google and Facebook would integrate the protocol into their respective mobile apps tomorrow. If not that, then someone would write a 'good enough', ad-free OpenSnap and put an APK on Github next week. You don't have to be one of the sharks on Shark Tank to see making an open protocol to a first party app implementation as a problem. Adobe can do that with PDF because they're Adobe, MS can do that with Exchange* because SMTP traffic is one of a dozen protocols it uses.

      We see this in Jabber - an open protocol that's pretty solid and well-maintained, enabling real-time text, voice, and video communication, complete with decentralization and anonymity options...and yet its userbase pales in comparison to Whatsapp, Kik, or Viber. I know that Z-Wave is a home automation protocol of some kind, but it's the Philips Hue lights that are prominently displayed on the endcaps of Home Depot and Microcenter. It is just the reality of our modern society that vertical integration is how money is made in the tech world. Pydio and Nextcloud exist, but everyone and their dog has an account with Dropbox and Google Drive.

      Protocols are necessary, but they are the result of altruism, not efficacy.

      *I am not suggesting MS invented the SMTP protocol, but they are using an open one.

    6. Re: Protocols not apps! by fluffernutter · · Score: 1

      On the contrary, Snapchat is pulling users away from Facebook right now. It is currently their moment in the sun.

      --
      Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
    7. Re:Protocols not apps! by Actually,+I+do+RTFA · · Score: 1

      It's worth noting FB chat was originally just another XMPP (Jabber) server. Then they added a nonstandard feature or two, to encourage people to move to the FB interface for FB chat. Then they changed the underlying protocol once enough of their user based was on it so you cannot use any old Jabber client.

      Any protocol where a specific client takes over enough power (IE6 HTML in 1996, or Chrome HTML5 2018) can extend a protocol to lock out competitors. Even if the protocol doesn't technically allow extensions (e.g. how IE had special comments you could add to the code that changed behaviors.) And, of course, that's leaving out colorful "interpretations" of the standards.

      --
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    8. Re: Protocols not apps! by dgatwood · · Score: 1

      Apparently, the GP is part of the hip crowd. Stealing marketshare from somebody else en masse is what happens right before a social network dies. Recall the life cycle of social networks (and communications networks in general):

      1. First, they attract the hip crowd.
      2. Then, they start attracting their parents.
      3. Then the hip crowd flees to a new social network.
      4. Then, they steadily decline until the only people still using them are over 60.

      Facebook losing significant marketshare to Snapchat marks the transition from stage 3 to stage 4, and also puts Snapchat squarely at the transition from stage 2 to stage 3.

      --

      Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.

  2. Get over it by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    These kids sound like the old grandpas that complained about the Microsoft Office ribbon a decade ago

    1. Re: Get over it by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Snap was fully aware that this backlash would come. Many people are going to fight any change. They had announced the coming change and warned investors that existing users would complain but it is something they feel they need to do to continue to grow.

      Unless this hits revenue too much either by lack of user base growth or reduced ad income the change won't be fully reversed.

    2. Re:Get over it by I'm+New+Around+Here · · Score: 5, Insightful

      The Microsoft Office ribbon still sucks.

      --
      If you think I voted for Trump because of this post, you're wrong. I voted for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party. Again.
    3. Re:Get over it by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      And the menus upon menus that preceded it were at all better?

    4. Re:Get over it by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Yes, it was. It was more organized and logical and took up less real estate. Change to improve something is good. Change for the sake of change and newness isn't.

    5. Re:Get over it by Godwin+O'Hitler · · Score: 1

      The menus were predictable. That's the least to be expected.

      --
      No, your children are not the special ones. Nor are your pets.
    6. Re:Get over it by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The menus were predictable. That's the least to be expected.

      That's the trouble. They were predictable, therefore they had to be abolished.

      Looking nice is in. Usability, unfortunately, is not.

    7. Re: Get over it by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yes. They were.

  3. refund! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    They should all ask for their money back! WTF

  4. but but but by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    How are the UX guys supposed to justify their jobs if they can't fuck up the interface every couple of weeks?

  5. What is Snapchat? by RightwingNutjob · · Score: 0

    Is it like sending 35mm negatives through the mail?

    1. Re:What is Snapchat? by Bob+the+Super+Hamste · · Score: 2

      Kind of but with lower quality. It is more like sending negatives taken with a Holga through the mail.

      --
      Time to offend someone
  6. Chatting by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It's how kids today chat. They send little pictures to one another to communicate a thought.

    If they're sad about their cheeseburger, they send a picture of a cheeseburger with a sad clown picture.

    When they like another person, they send a picture of their junk.

    Kids have given up on the written language and have gone to pictures and those yellow faces with all the emotions and shit on them.

    One day, someone will translate what the kids say in their pictures to Greek and then we can translate the Greek to English and understand what they are saying. They can put the translation on stone and put it under a rosemary bush and call it the Rosemary Stone.

    1. Re:Chatting by rgbscan · · Score: 3, Funny

      Oooh, communicating in metaphor like this might rise to "Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra". Count me in.

  7. Outside the USA by ArtemaOne · · Score: 1

    Currently deployed, so my phone wont adopt the new version. I really wonder how bad this can be if so many people hate it. I'm still running the old version and getting updates regularly to it.

    1. Re:Outside the USA by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Dude, it's horrible. What's worse is that users in the UK were lamenting this change several weeks ago, so they had to have known the uproar it would cause over here -- not that that would have prevented them from forcing the ridiculous UI on us anyway. It's almost like they'd prefer people to use IG stories.

  8. Do one for Hulu too, while you're at it by elrous0 · · Score: 1

    I resubbed to Hulu again on my Roku a while back and their new UI is almost unusable. Do the people that approve these new UI's even use their own services? There is no way that they do, or they would know they're taking a huge step backwards.

    Let's start with the basics, kids: An upgrade should offer an *improvement* in the user experience. Otherwise it's a downgrade.

    --
    SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
    1. Re:Do one for Hulu too, while you're at it by cmdr_klarg · · Score: 1

      I resubbed to Hulu again on my Roku a while back and their new UI is almost unusable. Do the people that approve these new UI's even use their own services? There is no way that they do, or they would know they're taking a huge step backwards.

      Let's start with the basics, kids: An upgrade should offer an *improvement* in the user experience. Otherwise it's a downgrade.

      I sure didn't approve of it; it was the reason I cancelled my subscription to them. That and the new interface didn't remember my favorites or where I was in the episodes when I did find them again.

      --
      THE SOFTWARE, IT NO WORKY!!!
    2. Re:Do one for Hulu too, while you're at it by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I resubbed to Hulu again on my Roku a while back and their new UI is almost unusable. Do the people that approve these new UI's even use their own services? There is no way that they do, or they would know they're taking a huge step backwards.

      Let's start with the basics, kids: An upgrade should offer an *improvement* in the user experience. Otherwise it's a downgrade.

      Not according to Microsoft. Look how much infinitely more popular the Windows 8 Metro/Modern/Blood Clot GUI is.

    3. Re:Do one for Hulu too, while you're at it by jetkust · · Score: 1

      I actually really like the new Hulu UI. I think it's the best UI out of them all. The older interface was more confusing. And I still hate the new Netflix "video always playing no matter what you do" UI. And Amazon's scatterbrained navigation UI isn't that great either.

    4. Re:Do one for Hulu too, while you're at it by x_t0ken_407 · · Score: 1

      Ugh, Hulu's interface change is even _worse_ than this one! It is order of magnitude more difficult to navigate in it now...I'm heavily considering canceling my account bc of it.

  9. update by Espectr0 · · Score: 1

    people always hate change right? even if it's positive... well not this time. the update actually isn't intuitive.

    the original goal was to make paid content separate from your friend's content, however they actually made it worse. If you go to the discover tab, you get one screen where both types are mixed together. If you tap on a friend's snap, it will switch next to a paid content's snaps.

    If you to to the chat tab, you do get only your friend's contents, but the sorting is erratic. if you have lots of contacts they will get buried down below if they don't post much

    1. Re:update by Voyager529 · · Score: 2

      people always hate change right? even if it's positive... well not this time. the update actually isn't intuitive.

      Well, I mean, to be fair, Snapchat's UI was never intuitive. There were no UI indicators as to whether to tap or swipe or hold, there are virtually no context menus, no 'back' buttons, and very little consistency for tasks in various swipe directions.

      The UX designers went for 'trendy minimalism' rather than allowing users with existing understanding of UI paradigms to leverage them. It's easily the worst UI I've worked with, and I configure Sonicwalls for a living.

    2. Re:update by lgw · · Score: 1

      The UX designers went for 'trendy minimalism' rather than allowing users with existing understanding of UI paradigms to leverage them. It's easily the worst UI I've worked with, and I configure Sonicwalls for a living.

      Perhaps I'm assuming more intelligence than is warranted, but I just assumed the UX designers went for "parent proof", and succeeded. Kids use Snapchat specifically because their parents don't.

      --
      Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
    3. Re:update by Voyager529 · · Score: 1

      Perhaps I'm assuming more intelligence than is warranted, but I just assumed the UX designers went for "parent proof", and succeeded. Kids use Snapchat specifically because their parents don't.

      It's a possibility, but I think Snapchat is inherently more parent-proof because of its anti-retention functions. Trading naughty pics and pejorative comments is far easier if you can keep your phone away from the 'rents for 24 hours; can't get in trouble for what they can't find, and even if they do find it, it limits the fallout vs. a since-forever Whatsapp thread. Additionally, I'd assume that the majority of parents aren't going to want to spend time on a social network that requires constant checking in order to not-miss stuff; parents also have a bit more affinity for looking back on older stuff than teens do and are thus more likely to utilize Whatsapp or Instagram.

      While the UI helps, for certain, I would argue that learning a UI is not the only barrier to entry for parents, and those who cared enough would learn the UI.

  10. In other news.. by sqorbit · · Score: 4, Funny

    1 million 14 yr old girls don't like change.

    --
    Sent from my TARDIS
  11. No free lunch by sjbe · · Score: 1

    When you have a single implementation of a protocol, some people are always going to hate it. When you have an open protocol with multiple client implementations, you can choose the UI that you like

    And then you get flame wars about which UI is best and added costs to handle them all plus a lot of reinventing the figurative wheel. There are drawbacks no matter what approach you use. I think in general I agree with you that the open protocol approach is better for most circumstances. Unfortunately it's not necessarily better for specific parties. For a circumstance like this I doubt Snapchat finds much profit in the protocol approach. Their house, their rules I guess.

    If there's only one implementation, particularly if it's closed source, then you're at the whims of whoever is responsible for it.

    Very true but in fairness not always a bad thing. (just usually) Having a single implementation can make things a lot simpler, less costly, and require less training. Whether or not that is a good thing in a particular circumstance is an exercise for the reader.

  12. Waaaiiit.... by Luthair · · Score: 0

    their complaint is that its hard to use? Its fucking snapshat hard to use is the primary feature.

  13. Please sign my letter to the petition signers by Cajun+Hell · · Score: 1

    Dear insufferably-stupid fuckwits whose obviously-stupid choices create the network effects that retard all progress and make everything worse for everyone,

    You all chose your app before your protocol. If you had chosen an open documented protocol and then chosen from the competing (and interoperable) implementations of that protocol, then you would have the UI that you want. You would be using an app that would be designed to serve you instead of whoever wrote it. You would not be locked in. You would be a hostage to no one. You would have everything you want, and your computer would be your tool, exclusively.

    But you chose to SUCK. You chose lameness and suffering.

    So go fuck yourselves. Fuck yourself hard, right up the ass, without lube, and as brutally as you would wish on your most despised enemy to which you would never even allow the slightest amount of dignity or even admit personhood. And keep fucking yourselves until you learn this incredible simple, obvious, easy lesson that anyone who reflects for a few minutes has always been able to learn.

    Yours Truly, Cajun Hell

    --
    "Believe me!" -- Donald Trump
    1. Re:Please sign my letter to the petition signers by Ksevio · · Score: 1

      I'm sure it'd be really popular to tell everyone using snapchat "Just download and compile this app for Jabber and we can send links to pictures hosted on our private web servers!" Network matters.

    2. Re:Please sign my letter to the petition signers by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I'm sure it'd be really popular to tell everyone using snapchat "Just download and compile this app for Jabber and we can send links to pictures hosted on our private web servers!" Network matters.

      Okay, but there is a cost to choosing such a product, and users are complaining about paying that cost.

  14. Are their customers complaining? by houghi · · Score: 1

    As long as their customers are not complaining, why would they change? This is like cows complaing that the farmer has cold hands.

    --
    Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
    1. Re:Are their customers complaining? by serviscope_minor · · Score: 1

      I do wish this simplistic "you're not the customer you're the product" meme would die. The cowscan't choose to leave, the app users can.

      On another note every update breaks someone's workflow. Insert xkcd.

      --
      SJW n. One who posts facts.
  15. paper by fluffernutter · · Score: 1

    How much thought does a person really put into responding on snapchat? Petitions on electronic media just don't have the same resonance, because you're likely to think about what you're signing a lot more if it is a real piece of paper.

    --
    Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
  16. Snapchat is an extremely crappy platform by nctritech · · Score: 1

    Snapchat's entire premise is that images will vanish after a few seconds but that's not true anymore. It had other social things bolted onto that framework later and they always felt bolted on and crappy. Snapchat's app has always been a pain in the ass to use and every iteration made it worse than the last. I made the mistake of reinstalling the app briefly a couple of days ago and I couldn't believe how hard to use it had become. It may be the least intuitive and discoverable UI ever designed in the history of modern GUI-based computing. I wouldn't cry if they went bankrupt and vanished into fat air.

  17. "intended to separate" ... bullshit! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "The changes were intended to separate interactions with friends from branded content"

    I call bullshit on that one, In fact, they've done the exact opposite: They took the discover page, where all the branded content lived and nobody went unless they inadvertently swiped left once too many, and merged it with the feed of the people you follow. So now when you watch Snaps of people you follow, it jumps right from the last one into a branded "Popular post". This is nothing but a failing attempt at monetising their app that will potentially cost them their entire user base.

  18. celebrities and influencers by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    no wonder I don't and won't have a snapchat account.

    Mind you the influencers did their job, they convinced me to stay the hell away from "social media" of all kinds.

  19. It's social media for the self absorbed ... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Many 'new features' are useless or defeat the original purposes Snapchat has had for the past years.

    It's all goddamned well fucking useless, and it was always intended to drive ad revenue to the people who own it.

    Stop thinking they give a shit about what you want.

  20. Wait... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "Many 'new features' are useless or defeat the original purposes Snapchat has had for the past years."

    Wasn't the original purpose for sending dick pics?

  21. Suck it by Provocateur · · Score: 1

    There is no turning back.

    Face it. WE ARE SNAPCHAT, and this is the future.

    For those of you 14-year olds that want the old snapchat back, we will re-issue it, using the prior protocols, but we will not be using the snapchat name. Henceforth, if you wish to retain the old UI and previous functionality, simply install Snappy McSnapface and everything old is new again. Happy Snapping, says Snappy McSnapface.

    --
    WARNING: Smartphones have side effects--most of them undocumented.
  22. Fueled by the need of continuous improvement by iampiti · · Score: 1

    Social apps want to grow in users all the time and they keep changing their product all the time to get more users, get them to spend more time or add more monetization options.
    The problem is that at some point your product is gonna be pretty good and adding more things usually makes it worse. The undelying problem is that the users are not the customers they're just the product and so what they want is a secondary concern.