Facebook: Shots Fired (at Snapchat?)

At the F8 conference Mark Zuckerberg showed off Facebook's new augmented reality strategy and features. With their augmented reality you could tag real world objects and potentially sell or purchase them, Nike will be able to show you your workout information through overlays, art or graffiti could be placed anywhere for people to see and there will be gaming experiences like table top 3D games. All of this is possible through a method called simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM), object recognition and 3D mapping. From the articles I have seen and read, many think this is a direct shot at Snapchat. I think this is partially that and also Facebook competing in the highly competitive social media world to keep their loyal users interested and to draw back the users who have lost interest. Facebook isn't the only company working on this kind of technology to compete with Snapchat; Apple is said to be releasing augmented reality features with their iPhone 8.

The video below is part of Mark Zuckerberg F8 conference. He explains the things I mentioned above in more detail. This video is what really peaked my interest on this topic. He speaks about these features not only being fun, but useful. With Facebook's augmented reality we could find hidden messages and art all over the world that we can't see normally see. This could be as exciting as Pokemon Go!