Aw, Snap! Parents Begin Flocking To Snapchat
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- Since its launch five years ago, Snapchat has become very popular with teens and college age students, allowing them to send photos and videos that disappear in seconds. Now, parents have started to invade the messaging app.
A recent comScore report declares Snapchat is "breaking into the mainstream." An estimated 14% of smartphone users 35 or older are on the messaging app. That's up from 2% from three years ago.
Sixty-year-old Greg D'Ambrosio from Roxborough is new to Snapchat.
"I'm on every other social media site, and as I'm aging in life I want to be socially active because you don't want to become a recluse shut in," he said. "I just want to be on as many socially active sites so I can be in touch with the world and news and people."
And Don Morgan, 49, from Pittsgrove, New Jersey, joined two weeks ago for the filters that can add special effects to the photos.
"My daughter had it, and she kept showing my wife and I these pictures of her with super imposed dog nose and ears, and it looked really funny. We liked it so my wife and I decided to get it and that's really the reason mostly for those filters," Morgan said. "I don't think that we've gotten into all the functionality of it, just those filters. They change everyday and we send pictures to each other everyday, my wife and I."
The trend resembles the way parents and grandparents flocked to Facebook years after it was adopted by college students.
"She's fine with us using technology and social media," Morgan said, "as long as we don't cross into her business."
Christine Robinson from Philadelphia joined a few months ago because of her daughter.
"Everyone loves taking photos and videos and sending messages and things of that nature," she said. "While my kids give me a hard way to go sometimes because they think it's more of a kid friendly platform, it's actually really a platform that I believe is for all ages"
D'Ambrosio agrees.
"I have a teenager and I didn't join to follow him," he said. "He's already blocked me on one site. I think it's Instagram because I'd see a picture of him and I'd say 'hey, look how cute my son looks.'"
In an effort to keep up with competitors like Facebook and Twitter, Snapchat has recently added new features like the ability to make audio and video calls, a news section, and just recently "Memories" which allows users to save their snaps or stories within the app.
