Tag: Snapchat Canada

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Mobile Syrup

Snapchat incorporates ChatGPT tech for its ‘My AI’ chatbot

Following in Spotify’s footsteps, Santa Monica, California-based Snapchat is also borrowing OpenAI’s ChatGPT and integrating it into its app.

Snapchat is introducing a ChatGPT-powered chatbot, and according to Snap’s CEO Evan Spiegel, the move is a bet on AI chatbots becoming a more prevalent part of people’s lives in the coming years.

Snapchat’s bot called “My AI” resides reside in the app’s chat tab, right above conversations with your snapchat contacts. The feature will be limited to Snapchat Plus subscribers at first, but according to Spiegel, in a statement given to The Verge, he wants the feature to be available to all Snapchat users for free in the future.

“The big idea is that in addition to talking to our friends and family every day, we’re going to talk to AI every day,” said Spiegel. “And this is something we’re well positioned to do as a messaging service.”

My AI reportedly answers questions in a way more restricted manner, when compared to regular ChatGPT. Snap’s employees have trained the bot to adhere to the company’s trust and safety guidelines and not give responses that include swearing, violence, sexually explicit content, or opinions about topics like politics.

So no, answering the Snapchat AI chatbot to do your homework for you wouldn’t work well. Instead of a productivity tool, My AI will function more like a persona that you can talk to. My AI is meant to be a virtual friend inside of Snapchat for users to hang out with, and not a dedicated search engine.

My AI is rolling out to Snapchat+ subscribers in the U.S. today, with a broader rollout to come sometime later.Read more about My AI here.

Image credit: Snap

Source: Snapchat Via: The Verge

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Mobile Syrup

Collaborate with friends of friends with Snapchat’s Shared Stories

Snapchat has updated its Custom Story feature to allow collaboration among more people. The new feature, which allows your friends to invite their friends to custom stories, is called “Shared Stories” and is available to all users now.

Custom Stories allowed you to post a story about any of your interests — let’s say sports — and add your friends to it. Those added could then see the story or contribute to it. Friends who are added to the new Shared Stories will be able to view and contribute to it, in addition to adding their contacts to the story as well, “making it easier for the whole soccer team, camp squad, or group of new coworkers to get in on the fun,” per Snap.

Just like regular stories, Shared Stories would also be visible for just 24 hours, though they won’t have a chat component to them, considering that users are unlikely to know all other participants.

Additionally, Snapchat’s automatic language detection will make sure all stories added are safe for other participants to view. In case you are added to a Shared Story that also contains a participant that you have blocked, Snapchat will notify you about it. “This gives Snapchatters the opportunity to leave the Shared Story, and ensures Snapchatters are always in complete control over who they share content with on our platform,” reads the company’s blog.

To try out the new feature, head to the profile page, tap on ‘New Story,’ and select ‘Shared Story.’ Learn more about the new feature here.

Image credit: Snapchat

Source: Snapchat

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Mobile Syrup

Snapchat to allow users to change their username once per year

Being stuck with a username that you made when you were young sucks, and while most social media platforms give you an option to update your username (at least once), others have lagged behind.

Newly added to the list of platforms that let you update your username is Snapchat, allowing you to finally go from “XxX_SpongeBOBLover1_XxX” to something more mature.

Snapchat previously allowed users to alter their display names (how your name appears when someone sends you a snap or message), but starting tomorrow, Wednesday, February 23rd, all Snapchatters across iOS and Android will be able to change their username without affecting their friend list, Snap code, Snap score and memories.

To update your username, tap your Bitmoji on the top left corner and navigate to ‘username.’ If you head to that section now, you’ll see that you can’t interact with it, but if you head to the section tomorrow, you’ll see a “Change Username” option, as seen in the image below:

Type in your desired username, tap next, and you’re good to go.

It’s worth noting that while Snapchat is allowing users to change their usernames, you’ll only be able to alter it once per year, so be prudent about the name you choose.

This comes soon after Snapchat announced that it would allow users to share real-time locations with friends.

Image credit: Snapchat

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Mobile Syrup

Canada’s Snapchat Lens of the Year is ‘Big Mouth’

Snapchat has released a list of the most popular lenses used by more than 10 million Canadians throughout 2021.

Going forward, Snapchat aims to release this list annually to reflect back upon the Lenses that revolutionized the way Snapchatters created, explored, learned and played the past year.

“We’re amazed by the creativity and technical prowess of our community that has supercharged Snapchatter’s appetite for augmented reality,” said Sophia Dominguez, Snap’s head of AR platform partnerships.

  1. Big Mouth was the most popular Lens of 2021 and was used by more than 11.7 million Snapchatters.
  2. Soft Filter was used by more than 11.5 million Snapchatters this year.
  3. More than 9.7 million Snapchatters put on a Happy Face in 2021.
  4. Butterfly Cheeks was used by over 9.5 million users.
  5. 8.3 million Snapchatters across Canada turned themselves into Broccoli Head.
  6. ROM‘s Snapchat AR experience that showed the true scale of how massive Whales actually are was a hit, and so was the Little Bernie, with Snapchatters around the world placing the U.S. Senator in their meme-Snaps.

Clothing brand Levis and Snapchat collaborated this past year by creating a ‘Double Portal’ lens that allowed users to virtually try on a customized ‘Trucker’ jacket, whereas Tim Hortons and Snapchat partnered to create a custom lens that helped spread awareness about Tim Hortons’ ‘Smile Cookie initiative,’ which donates to 625+ local charities and organizations in communities across Canada.

Find Snapchat’s full global Lens report here.

Image credit: Snapchat

Source: Snapchat