For those wondering why, check out slides 14 and 15 of the 2013 KPCB Internet Trends report:<p><a href="http://www.slideshare.net/kleinerperkins/kpcb-internet-trends-2013/14" rel="nofollow">http://www.slideshare.net/kleinerperkins/kpcb-internet-trend...</a>
I wonder how many millions will end up at Google since Snapchat is built on Google App Engine. [1]<p>[1] <a href="http://gigaom.com/2013/05/07/snapchats-act-of-faith-in-building-on-google-compute-engine&#x2F" rel="nofollow">http://gigaom.com/2013/05/07/snapchats-act-of-faith-in-build...</a>;
And then the kids will move on to the next thing. Hopefully, for the sake of their investors, that happens after they've been acquired for a billion. Rinse, repeat.
I tutored teenagers in physics and math for a while to make ends meet. And they <i>love</i> snapchat. They are also basically ready to be done with facebook.<p>There are two reasons they prefer snapchat to facebook and texting, respectively, both of which basically come down to privacy:<p>1) Their parents are on facebook<p>2) They know that what they say today might look stupid tomorrow, and facebook (and the phone companies) save everything, forever.<p>Basically, they have figured out that what they say when they are 13 will look ridiculous when they are 17. And what they say when they are 17 will be really cringe-worthy when they are in college. They also know that facebook's track record on privacy is awful, so even if they went through the trouble to create different types of friend lists, with different access settings, etc., facebook could just change everything tomorrow.<p>I could easily see snapchat expanding to build an entire social network built around the "only see for 10 seconds and its gone" feature, and droves of teenagers moving onto it. If they do, facebook could be in serious trouble.
It is important to note that in the startup community it is generally a good tactic to raise money <i>when you don't need it</i>, because that gives you enormous leverage in the negotiation. If, on the other hand, you're in a negotiation where the other side knows you need the money, you are going to get much worse terms.
Great for them. Snapchat is the only service in recent memory that I've actually overheard high schoolers use as a verb. If you can define a new way to share something that gets its own language, you've got something pretty interesting.
What I'd be curious about is how much of this round (if any) is secondary / going to cash out some early employees / founders / early investors.
My favorite part is they appear to be snubbing the Valley and the traditional VC's. That's brave and admirable and healthier for the entire ecosystem.
Interesting to see everyone speculate on how terrible of an investment this is when most users couldn't wrap their head around the concept of Snapchat ~7 months ago.<p>Here's why the need $100 million: They are building the future of chat and they already have incredible engagement and growth month over month.