Social media clone attack

In the global technology renaissance that we live in, it is baffling that companies continue to clone competitors’ features instead of creating new and interesting tech. This week, Facebook has chosen to clone Snapchat.
Instagram, owned by Facebook, had already started going head to head with Snapchat at the end of 2016 when they released Instagram Stories which enabled users to send disappearing messages and photos to friends and family. The social media platform Snapchat has been around for several years, a favourite among younger demographics due to the perceived anonymity that Snapchat provides. Users could send a photo or message that would disappear when opened giving recipients of the message only 8 seconds to watch before the message was deleted or post a photo for 24 hours on a ‘story’ and then it would disappear forever. Well, first Instagram copied Snapchat and now Facebook is doing the same.
Facebook, the global giant, is close to reaching two billion registered users. It also has invested wisely acquiring both WhatsApp with one billion active users and Instagram with 500 million users, with both platforms continuing to grow quickly in all nations except China. Unfortunately, Facebook was unable to acquire Snapchat, which it tried to purchase for US$3 billion. The penalty for saying ‘no’ to a sale to Facebook, or at least it looks that way; is for Snapchat to have their technology cloned by all platforms that Facebook owns.
Facebook launched Messenger Day this week. The feature within the Messenger app functions similarly to Instagram Stories and Snapchat, where users can compile posts that disappear after 24 hours. At launch, Messenger included more than 5,000 frame, effects, and stickers that users can apply to their content.
For influencers and brands, the clones of social media create more work for creative departments that create content. Brands must duplicate efforts on Snapchat, Instagram Stories and now Facebook’s Messenger Day to reach followers. Previously, brands used diverse content like placing an eye-catching photo and post on Instagram, a live silly video on Snapchat and a detailed post on Facebook; but now they must create a different short story on all of the daily Snapchat clones as well as creating their regular content.
Which clone will stand the test of time is anyone’s guess but until then, the cloning continues – with creatives everywhere hard at work creating new content for social media.