The week in social: Snap Kit, Twitter updates, and Spectacles come to amazon

You can now snap up your Spectacles on Amazon

After the questionable success of its first generation Spectacles, Snap released its latest version of the eyewear/recording gear/creep-cams in late April, and now social savvy peeps the US, UK and Canada can get their very own on Amazon. Although there are reportedly still hundreds of thousands of first generation Spectacles sitting in a factory somewhere, for interested parties, the tech was surprisingly hard to come by when it was first released. Snap is nipping that problem in the bud this time around, selling their wares through the online giant to expand its reach and get more people rocking the rethought, recreated, and water resistant gear, all for a cool $150.

Read more at We Are Social Media

From shopping in stores to shopping in Stories

Since Instagram launched shoppable tags in 2016, the feature has become a hit with brands and users alike. After all, who doesn’t love to mix their social stalking with a little online shopping? With that in mind, the feature will now make its merry way to Stories, where specialized stickers will lead users to product and purchase details for featured products. Instagram made it clear via press release that it’s done its homework, and says: “With 300 million using Instagram Stories everyday, people are increasingly finding new products from brands they love. In a recent survey, Instagrammers said they often watch stories to stay in the know with brands they’re interested in, get an insider view of products they like, and find out about new products that are relevant to them.” And now, praise be, those users can add “shopping” to that list.

Read more at TechCrunch

Instagram calls off screenshot notifications

Earlier this year, Instagram started testing a feature that notified users when someone took a screenshot of their stories. Now, they’ve inexplicably put an end to it. Though they’re yet to comment on the change, it would certainly come as a relief to many a social-screenshotter, and now Stories users can go on living in sweet ignorance, continuing to create embarrassing/inspiring/would-be ephemeral content for the rest of us to consume without so much as them knowing we’d watched. Because hey… sometimes that’s bad enough.

Read more at Mashable

Snap launches a developer platform

From today, developers will be able to make their apps even ‘snappier’ thanks to Snap Kit – a fully-fledged developer kit that lets app makers bring core features of Snapchat into their apps. If all goes well, this could be a turn around for Snapchat, allowing the platform’s little bits of genius to reach an even wider audience, all with the promise of added security. There are four ways the offering lets developers integrate with Snapchat: Creative Kit lets apps integrate their own stickers, filters, and links into the Snapchat camera; Bitmoji Kit lets users bring their personalized Snapchat avatar to other apps; Story Kit lets apps search and embed stories submitted on the public Our Story feature; and Snap Kit lets users log in to apps via Snapchat.

Read more at The Inquirer

Twitter’s Happening Now and Explore are about to get more personal

Everyone’s favorite birdie is taking some of the social heavy lifting once required on its platform out of users’ hands. It’s now digging the tweets it thinks they’ll care about most out of the timeline and making them easier to find – a bonus for newbies to the platform as well as veterans. Last week, the company announced a new focus on delivering more relevant, personalized tweets, and live video on news and events, highlighting its ongoing dedication to real-time conversation and news. These changes to Happening Now, Explore, Moments, and the search tool, allow the platform to deliver more custom content to its users. Some of these offerings are rolling out now, while others are expected to launch over the next few months.

Read more at Digital Trends

Snapchat embraces regret with its Clear Chats feature

If you’ve never hit ‘send’ and instantly wanted to take it back, Snapchat is now, even more than ever, the platform for you. It’s upped its ephemeral appeal by gifting its most ‘speak now, think later’ users with a Clear Chats feature, meaning they can delete messages they’ve sent, even the ones that haven’t been read. The feature works for group chats and one-on-one conversations, though users in a chat room will be notified that a message was deleted (a small, small price to pay). So whether it’s a typo, an embarrassing photo, an unrequited profession of love, or all of the above, rest assured you can now take it all back… with Snapchat. *music plays*

Read more at Digital Trends