Slingshot — Facebook's new ephemeral photo/video app

@daveambrose was quick on the trigger to hunt this when Facebook (intentionally?) leaked this on the App Store last week. Downloading it now...

Slingshot is now available worldwide.

Been waiting for a text message to confirm my number for a few mins.... I think they're getting hammered.

My first sling: The Mario Paint music while doodling is an interesting choice.

@ _Hanks_ exactly. Before we used to rank all products by total number of upvotes, giving products posted early in the day a huge advantage. We're still playing with the algo but it's much better now, imho.

@mulligan - I definitely agree the UX is a little clumsy but so is Snapchat's. The key is getting users over that "hump" where they get it and grow accustomed to its idiosyncrasies. That said, I need to play with it a bit more to have a stronger opinion. Here are some interesting design decisions and observations: - Doodle music - love it or hate it, the music when you doodle accomplishes two things (1) sets a playful, silly tone and (2) might inspire WOM (the "mario paint music" grabs attention). - "Locked" photos - to view a photo from a friend for the first time, you must send them a photo in exchange. While this adds friction to use the product, my hunch is that it increases engagement in aggregate. - Inviting people - Users can invite people via SMS but not Facebook. - "Just for you" - When a friend sends you a photo directly (and not to several people), it tells you it was "just for you." I like this. This is one of my complaints with Snapchat in that unless your friend mentions your name or makes it obvious, it's unclear how thoughtful they were in choosing to send that photo to me because of the one-to-many. On the other hand, it makes one-to-one flirting more obvious. ;) - "Hidden People" - I've had a few weirdos send me snaps on Snapchat before and I haven't taken the time to figure out how to block them. Thankfully you can hide people on Slingshot. P.S. I forgot to plug my username earlier: rrhoover (sling me!) P.P.S. Curious to hear @ogtfaber's (from Taptalk) thoughts on this.

Odd that I had to send my first sling to their team. I suspect this gets easier over time, but the whole "reply before you read" thing makes it hard to have an actual conversation (but maybe that's not what this is about?)

This app is a mess. The UX is crazy. Some places where triggers should be ("you have a new message from X, but you need to send X a message first") doesn't trigger you to send X a message. It actually does nothing. You have to go, take a photo, and then send it to X to see it. I love the onboarding. So simple. But overall using the app is a mess.

This whole Slingshot seems like nothing like Facebook - Why can't I just select my FB friends and send the video? - Why should I invite my own FB friends first? Shouldn't they automatically get the notification? - I can invite by SMS/Email and not via FB? Really? I was going to use it, but now I have to wait for my friends to actually use it. I for one know they already use Messenger. So why didn't they integrate with Messenger? So many questions....confused...

You're not seasoned product hunters if you haven't worked out how to switch app stores yet :P [If you're not on the US store, just switch to it – select 'None' under payment info and fake the phone number/Zip.] Initial impressions: Facebook are trying too hard. Their on-boarding videos are nice, I guess – they did the same with Paper – but soon they'll realise that packing animations and sound effects doesn't replace the need to solve a problem. Certainly not if they intend on users coming back over time. Likewise, the concept of 'locked' photos doesn't feel genuine somehow. Rather they've sat down and thought, "how are we going to beat SnapChat?" It's dressed up as a cool feature but really they were just solving for the best engagement hack. Even if I'm wrong, if successful this mechanism would create the behaviour of replying to a message you haven't yet seen. In itself, a long shot (pun intended) to expect that to catch on. Who knows, maybe this is what everyone's been waiting for..

I wonder if non-US users would be able to use http://www.producthunt.com/posts... to get access?

@abiekatz @ow couldn't agree more. I just had a "test convo" with a friend and it became an unrewarding hassle pretty quickly. There's also no graceful way to end the conversation. I stopped sending pictures and now I have that little red 1 staring at me in my "Social" folder. I don't see why people would use this over snapchat or taptalk

@abiekatz I had the same experience - I just took pictures of tables and the floor just to see what people have sent me. It seems like a good idea in theory but it's poor in practice. The app is a little weird and confusing to use, too, since it doesn't link into FB at all

Great to see Facebook innovating and experimenting with new UIs. I personally think the reply to unlock feature is forced and strange, and will ultimately kill the app. However I think they're talking about the app in the right way, its about lightweight informal photo sharing and getting a stream/feed of updates from friends, not so much about a back and forth chat. It will be interesting to watch as these two spaces (photo sharing and messaging) increasingly merge together - which apps will breakthrough and become clear leaders. The next year holds great promise for this space.

My question here: Is f(Social density + utility/enjoyment) ___ Pain of learning new UX? A) > B) < Side note: this crush of upvotes right now is giving great insight into the value of recency in the ranking algorithm on PH...right, @rrhoover?

Taptalk is still easier, one click sends and no games of having to send before receiving. Slingshot also seems a _little_ too overdesigned.

Two questions: 1) Why don't they just take the existing Messenger platform and map the two together? 2) Why can't Facebook get its act together and release apps like this on *both* iOS and Android simultaneously?! They did the same thing with Paper...

I dig the pixelation effects and thought the on-boarding with their "team" was really effective. Also interesting to see that you can't "upload your phone book" to find matching SMS contacts at least not on Android. Possibly in response to all the brouhaha around Snapchat doing the same.

@jmover "a bit too simple." --- things no user has ever said about software products. I'm with @ogtfaber, this doesn't even feel like the same space. Broadcast, gimmick to view content (my response matters on what you sent me, not knowing is weird), insane over designed onboarding and edu, preview of photo, no map as part of the content, etc etc... time will tell, iterate fast.

After all the rumours I expected a more close resemblance. Taptalk and Slingshot have little in common. Actually this article by Shane highlights some of the important differences: https://medium.com/@shanemac/tap...