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Comment by Analemma_ | Hacker News Reader

> Grandma and Grandpa are not going to use Snapchat, and I'm not sure Snapchat wants them to.

There's no maybe about it: Snapchat definitely doesn't want them. Evan Spiegel has been very upfront that he doesn't want the riff-raff. Snapchat has always been deliberately shitty on Android and Spiegel went out of his way to make clear how they definitely weren't going to make a Windows Phone application, back when WP was a potential player. If you're not a cool, hip teen with an iPhone, you can piss off.

He reminds me a lot of that Abercrombie CEO who said that they didn't want fatties and uglies in their stores, which was a winning strategy until it suddenly wasn't.

This is partially why, as much as I hate Facebook, I'm not particularly upset at Snapchat slowly getting steamrolled by them. Businesses that stick up their middle finger at potential customers out of snobbery deserve to fail.

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To be fair to Evan Spiegel and Snap, almost no-one was interested in doing versions of their apps for Windows Phone.

Windows Phone turned up late to the party - third or fourth horse (remember Blackberry?) in an already competitive two horse race. A lot of the apps that made it to Windows Phone were paid for by MS.

It's also worth bearing in mind the advice of "its better to make something 100 people love than 1000 people like".

Marketing is a dark art, and signalling is real. Trying to appeal to everyone, especially when you are a scrappy startup, sounds like a great way to appeal to absolutely no-one.

He reminds me a lot of that Abercrombie CEO who said that they didn't want fatties and uglies in their stores, which was a winning strategy until it suddenly wasn't.

To be fair, my impression is that this aspect of their marketing wasn't the problem; the Great Recession was the problem, because suddenly no one had 2 – 4x the money to pay for a piece of clothing that only differed from the competition in that it told other teens you have 2 – 4x the money.

Great Recession + fast fashion seems to be the real culprit.

The market for elitism has never disappeared in that domain. Maybe any domain.

There's a difference between being an upscale brand and actually turning away customers. Apple and BMW are elite brands, but if you're poorer but save up for one because you want it that bad, they'll happily take your money. Snapchat and Abercrombie are looking at people who want to give them money and telling them to go away.

Is Snap really telling anyone to go away? You can download and use the app for free.

By your own definition, how are kids with iPhones cool? They're the choice of old people everywhere. Every teen I see has some sort of jazzed up Android (phablet).

It's like the Porsche 911. Great car, but definitely not cool. 3/4 of the people driving them are of retirement age. Definitely not cool by any stretch of the imagination.

Granted, this is a year old now, but the data doesn't match your assertion, at least in the US.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/ewanspence/2016/04/13/apple-mar...

70% of kids can't be hip and cool. It's a numbers game where being the winner means losing cool cred.

For example, do your parents have iPhones? Anything your parents are into instantly loses cool.

Not necessarily. A few years ago Blackberry, the corporate phone of choice, was super-cool with teenagers.

After the London riots there were lots of breathless articles about the menace of BBM and how the yoof were using it to plan their mischief.

Because BB messaging was exempt from data caps etc thanks to agreements between Blackberry and carriers.

I have seen similar outcomes when carriers have introduced unlimited calling plans "because teens only text", only for said teens to switch to calling en mass.

I feel like Snapchat is aging out of coolness and there's nothing they can do about it. First adopters are in the workforce and probably starting families by now. Do kids want to be on the same social media platform their uncle or aunt are posting baby pictures on?

I have never seen a baby picture on Snapchat. I'm sure it'll get to that point with that happening a bit. But Snapchat is pretty far away from being like that.

There also isn't any other social network that is close to being big. There's just the current incumbents. For teens i can think of Musically, but that's a focused app. On the other hand I am actually surprised Snapchat didn't try to go and buy Musically.

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