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They explicitly focused on teens in rich countries with high end phones and high speed mobile connections. They wanted to target that “rich” niche.

Yeah, I think instagram has eaten snapchats lunch just by having a much better (more performant) implementation. The snapchat app are so much more battery than anything else on my phone that I've actually completely uninstalled it, even though I quite liked using it.

Snapchat didn't have to be a fad. Spiegels incompetence as a CEO and as a product person killed the business.

Market segmentation. Apple users are worth more money. Which kinda makes this pivot to the developing world a bit of head scratcher. High ARPC was one of the key differentiators they promoted back during their IPO.