Snapchat has caved in to demands to reinstate the old Snapchat look. Well, kind of.
The self-destructing messages service is currently rolling out a new design to iOS users, undoing at least a few of the contentious changes it introduced with its previous redesign.
These changes include a revised layout which puts Snaps and Chats in chronological order again, just as they were before the company started messing around with Snap’s look and feel. The same is true with Stories from friends, which now (re)appear on the right side of the interface. Finally, the app opens in camera mode, just as it did before the redesign.
“We learned that combining watching Stories and communicating with friends into the same place made it harder to optimize for both competing behaviors,” Snap CEO Evan Spiegel said during the company’s most recent earnings call. “We are currently rolling out an update to address this by sorting communication by recency and moving Stories from friends to the right side of the application, while maintaining the structural changes we have made around separating friends from creators and sorting friends’ Stories by relationships.”
Snapchat’s difficult few months
Snapchat has had a tough time this year. Although very popular among its predominantly young user base, it has stalled in its growth. Late last year, Snapchat CEO Evan Spiegel announced that changes would be made to the app after Snapchat fell short of expected growth projections for the quarter.
A redesign of the app followed, although it has been immensely polarizing. A Change.org petition concerning the update attracted more than 1.2 million signatures from disgruntled users. Most notably, Snapchat’s value fell by $1.3 billion after reality TV star Kylie Jenner Tweeted about her disapproval of the app, saying “Sooo does anyone else not open Snapchat anymore?”
CEO Spiegel initially said that while he knew changes were likely to be, “disruptive to our business in the short term,” he opined that, “We’re willing to take that risk for what we believe are substantial long-term benefits to our business.” However, since then his stance appears to have loosened. In response to the Change.org petition, Snap assured users that, “We hear you, and appreciate that you took the time to let us know how you feel. We completely understand the new Snapchat has felt uncomfortable for many.”
Will this latest redesign appease users? We’ll have to wait and see!
Source: The Verge
