Why the Next Snapchat Won't Look Like Snapchat
A take on why the current social platforms are simple iterations masquerading as transformations
Social media was always about status updates, from the very beginning.
Just consider the progression. Facebook's "What's on your mind?" gave us text-based broadcasting. Instagram said "show, don't tell" with photos. Snapchat and later TikTok pushed us toward video, then short-form video.
We were promised a deeper human connection with each modality shift. Each delivered a more sophisticated performance theatre on the same shallow stage. I strongly believe this evolution was not innovation; it was iteration masquerading as transformation.
Every new platform thinks the next breakthrough is just a shinier way to package the same old status update. Longer videos. Better filters. More production value.
Ring any bells? It should. This is something we see across every tech cycle: improving the efficiency of an existing model instead of questioning the model itself.
It's like adding cup holders to a horse-drawn carriage instead of inventing the automobile. We've been creating incremental capabilities while ignoring fundamental limitations.
The limitation? Status updates, by their very nature, are performative snapshots that tell us almost nothing about who someone actually is.
I don't have the perfect answer for what this looks like yet. But the founders who figure it out first will likely build the most valuable social platforms of the next decade.
The question isn't whether this shift will happen. It's whether you'll see it coming before your competitors do.
Some of the possible paths one can reasonably approximate (and what I’ve been spending mental cycles on):
New UI Paradigm: The birth of AI leads to the reimagining of consumer experiences. Or leads to new hardwares to reimagine social interactions from scratch.
New Depth of Connection: Now that we have “thinking machines”, we can store and share a new level of social understanding, leading to new solutions of social connections altogether
New Search: somebody creates a good way of searching through DMs (have you tried searching through your X DMs xD)
P.S. - If you're building something in this space that goes beyond traditional social feeds, I'd love to hear about it.