Snapchat intensifies this kind of guttural pain by putting you in someone else’s present. And then, mimicking reality, converts the moment from something you can experience to a memory. Different from networks of the past and even its contemporaries, Snapchat’s organizing principle is ephemerality. As Snapchat consultant Nathan Jurgenson explored in a 2014 blog post, most social media is organized around a permanent media object—like a photo or block of words—and communication happens only in service of it. The media object is a kind of precious trophy that leads people to do things like stand on a chair above their dinner just to get the perfect shot.
