Facebook has officially released their new app, Slingshot, which was accidentally leaked/teased to the app store early last week and then quickly removed. The concept of this app is to share photos via message with friends, similar to the well known app Snapchat, but Facebook says they put a different approach to this app that will make it stand out and not be the same.
One of the first things I thought when having seen the release of Slingshot was "how could this possibly be any different than Snapchat which already controls the market?" In a way, I think it really is. Though, there are some noticeable differences which Facebook has implemented. Photos and videos will actually stay on the feed your created much longer, to be exact, they will be up until you deleted them. Unlike Snapchat photos which disappear after a few seconds, Slingshots will stay live and can be seen again and again until they are removed. Pretty cool in my opinion.
Another thing Facebook has done differently is that they will not be letting users see a photo that a friend has sent to them until they respond with another photo. This seems to encourage you and the friend to interact. Plus, now I can finally figure out who has been clicking my Snapchats just to make the notification disappear.
You can still draw on your photos and type messages on them like Snapchat, which they seem similar with. Yahoo pointed out that Facebook did make attempts to address Snapchat in their announcement of the new app.
" We’ve enjoyed using Snapchat to send each other ephemeral messages and expect there to be a variety of apps that explore this new way of sharing," Facebook writes on its blog. "With Slingshot, we saw an opportunity to create something new and different: a space where you can share everyday moments with lots of people at once."
We will be playing with this app over the next few days and seeing how it is. Obviously, the big comparison and competitor is going to be Snapchat even though Facebook seems to be trying to make a point about how different they are from them and other apps like this, I think we will find quite a lot to be similar. Overall, I am excited to see what this app has in store. I think this will be an eye opener for the people at Snapchat and we might start seeing some updates or new features on both sides of the line. Competition can be good and with such a large company jumping into this instant photo/video messaging, it keeps other ones that are on top on their toes.
What are you thoughts on this new app? Total knockoff or great new idea?
Slingshot is available for download on the App Store right now. [via Yahoo and Facebook]
