Well, that did not take long. Snapchat's legal team has sent developer Rudy Huyn a letter accusing him of "violation of federal and state law" for reproducing the Snapchat "Discover" content. The missive comes just 24-hours after the release of 6discover, a new, free app that pulls the Snapchat Discover content and bypassing Snapchat's official app feature.
The issue appears to be about money, ultimately. Discover is a way for companies to produce and distribute content through Snapchat. Companies like Comedy Central, Vice, and CNN pay Snapchat for this privilege, in essence making it an advertising platform.
The problem is, 6discover pulls the content but does not return on the analytics. Therefore, Snapchat cannot count the Windows Phone app views in their data sent back to their customers – those media conglomerates mentioned above – and charge them appropriately.
Considering Snapchat's CEO Evan Spiegel does not think Windows Phone worthy enough of a Snapchat app due to little market share it is rather ironic to point out that 6discover could hurt them in any way.
For his part, Huyn has responded on Twitter (and presumably in writing) to Snapchat noting "we can work together on Analytics to include #windowsphone users to your stats and improve Discover visibility". He also tweets that his app has no privacy or security issues, making the problem even more trivial.
However, it is doubtful Snapchat will take him up on his offer.
For now, it is unclear if the app will be removed or where things go from here. One thing is certain, Snapchat as a company, while legally correct, is taking a very aggressive attitude against Windows Phone users. A position that could be attenuated simply making an official Snapchat app for Windows Phone, something for which Huyn has offered to do in the past.
