Snapchat and the guy who said no to Facebook: "Three billion ... - The Republic

TWO years ago, at Stanford University classmates laughed at his velletaria idea of ??creating a new instant messenger application. And who knows what they must have thought yesterday when Evan Spiegel, just turned twenty-three years, he refused to sell his Snapchat to Facebook, the most popular social network in the world, despite the stratospheric offer of $ 3 billion. Snapchat is tempting to the giants of the web, it also wants Google. But for now it looks like it’s for sale.

The news, revealed by the Wall Street Journal, undoubtedly curious: what would push Facebook groped in what would be the most expensive acquisition in the history of Facebook, far exceeding (the three times) that of Instagram, the social network to share photos bought a year ago to “only” $ 1 billion. And what makes it so valuable company created by the young student? The technical difference with the other systems of instant message is that with Snapchat you can select the length of the messages. The photos and videos shared by the application in fact, have a deadline and after a time it will cancel automatically.

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found very popular with teenagers, who use the app to share photos and funny messages or sexual (the so-called sexting ), without a trace. Just young adults as those who, according to market research, in recent months seem to have grown tired of Facebook and are looking for new social network. That’s why Mark Zuckerberg has approached almost the same age Evan proposing the acquisition. But in addition to the two young computer genius in common also have the business acumen and an unbounded ambition. That revolves around a precise number: 400 million, that is, the total number of photos uploaded to Facebook each day. Why should I yield Snapchat now that he has a traffic of about 350 million – is the bet of Evan – when I could increase to nearly 400 million and treat in a position of strength with the colossus of Menlo Park? A gamble, of course, but this seems to work.

Think that the idea of ??Snapchat is the result of a case: two years ago Evan was working together with his friend Bobby Murphy in an app to be presented as a project for an exam. One evening, a classmate was complaining to their smartphones in front of her, “I wish these pictures I’m sending to my girlfriend disappear.” A few days later, in September of 2011 it was the first version of Snapchat: Picaboo. Despite the scetticiscmo colleagues, two years after the application created by Spiegel in the living room of his father, according to data from the Pew Research Centre, has passed the five million users per day and has been downloaded by at least 9% of U.S. smartphone, a quarter in the age group most sensitive, ie between 18 and 29 years.

Numbers that have aroused the interest not only of Facebook. According to rumors in the world of business reported by the site Valleywag, the Chinese e-commerce site Tencent Holdings, would even put on the table four billion dollars. And after the door shut in the face of Zuckerberg, Google also entered into negotiations would be, if only to annoy the rival Facebook. But, at least for this year, now seems difficult to turn.