I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. Snapchat kind of started because of nudes, right? But I mean, look at it. Go open your Snapchat app, swipe over to the spot where you can see your friends’ stories, and look at the things that bombard you. Mine range from…sponsored posts for Peacock and Me Undies (separate posts) to…Snapchat original content involving Ryan Reynolds and flaming dumbbells to…a LAD Bible story about a teenager calling the cops asking for her fake ID back to…someone called alanah to…a Daily Meme (?) featuring Megan Fox in lingerie to…a story from CBC News about police killing an indigenous teenager.
That is a jarring assortment of content. And I didn’t yet mention the post from something called “Haymakers” about a female fighter choking out another fighter at weigh-ins. Three of the eight things I’ve now mentioned involve people in their underwear, and the proportion doesn’t change when I take a sample of the first sixteen things on that page.
Bonkers.
Maybe this is because I don’t really use Snapchat, and it hasn’t acclimated to my preferences. Maybe I’ve accidentally told it I really like things I don’t really like. But if this is the median Snapchat content, how the hell did Snap Inc’s stock more than double in 2019, even before quarantine boredom and Robinhood turned the stock market into an elaborate joke?
I am bamboozled.
