Snapchat Presents New Tools That Make Cunarant Creators Flooded

Lens AR Snapchat (photo: dock. Snap)

JAKARTA - Snap Inc., Snapchat's parent company this week held a development event dubbed Lensfest. They announced that currently there are more than 300,000 developers who make Augmented Reality (AR) products for their applications, by generating more than 3 million AR Lens through their creation tools.

But that's not what's interesting about the show, which is about monetization, where Snap works with some creators making lenses that include digital items that can be purchased, such as clothing, accessories, enhanced lens controls and more.

All of that can be purchased with Snap Token, and this will be another step towards building additional revenue streams, both for creators and Snap itself, as well as providing incentives for them to continue to be creative.

"We are very optimistic that this will create more opportunities for Snapchatter to pay for the value they get from our experience," said Snap's CTO, Bobby Murphy.

"And then also motivate more investment, time, and effort and improve quality levels around use cases," he added.

According to The Verge, Thursday, December 8, the new monetization tool may sound like a little bit of AR evolution, but it's a major bet for Snap, where building an AR business is also important for Snap's long-term prospects.

The company knows very well that face lensing on smartphones is not the final form of AR, they also have long-term vision for AR Snap by involving special glasses, always-on experience, and software that understands exactly what users are seeing and what they might want.

"If I choose to put a hardware on my face, it should add value to my life almost every minute I put it on. Otherwise, I will choose not to do it," Snap's computer vision engineering director Qi Pan said.

It is known that Snap's smart glasses version, Spectacles, has been in the hands of developers for more than a year now. However, Spectacles is still an old gadget with a large battery life, having excess heat problems, relatively low resolution and small field of view.

However, Murphy said he saw enough to convince Snap was now on the right track to further develop Spectacles.