With the rise of social media over the last decade Snapchat has become increasingly popular, not only for communicating with friends, meeting new people, playing doodle guess & snapping silly pictures, but saving memories. Snapchat memories holds many a memory for people all around the world, varying from memories of passed away pets, fun times with friends, concerts, relatives that’ve passed, and memories throughout educational institutions, etc… 

Snapchat has now included ways of payment to their company through Snapchat Plus, Bitmoji Clothing, and they have advertisements plastered across their platform. Through this alone they receive enough revenue as a company, which is apparent considering the app has been in use for over a decade. For younger people, or the disadvantaged, Snapchat is a way of storing these memories without having the extra costs. Removing or altering this is costing those people fond memories and the right to capture moments which were promised to them for many years.

Other social media platforms have induced further revenue through more socially acceptable counterparts. Snapchat has too incorporated such media that has been used for decades, being advertisements and subscription opportunities. Companies like TikTok and Twitch allow users to donate or contribute small to larger sums of money consensually through live streams of their favourite content creators. 

Physical media, being cameras, video tapings, and audio recordings have become increasingly more expensive due to the lack of use and demand for greater quality products. Audio vinyls have risen from $2-$10 dollars to $50-$300 dollars to improve sound quality and risk of breakage, this is not due to inflation as some may think. The contemporary method to listen and record music is through platforms like Spotify and Apple Music, which come to a monthly subscription pay rate, yet still, are accessible through a non-subscription feature. Access to physical media has also become increasingly harder, laptops no longer, or rarely, sell any devices with a dvd disc drive, VHS tapes are well beyond the norm of usage, and physical cameras, which have been popularised for the aesthetic or quality still are increasingly becoming expensive.

In Australia, the ban of social media is being implemented for users under the age of sixteen through biometrics and identification. Before this ban is implemented, these younger children should have the opportunity to store their saved memories. 

At the end of the day, we believe Snapchat memories are very monumental to the people. There should not be a capitalistic paywall behind saving memories on a free app that a lot of us have loyally used for 5+ years, especially not during such an outrageous cost of living crisis. 

Lastly, we highly encourage people signing to comment their feelings and opinions on this new implementation to create more discussion on the topic. Thank you for your support and signatures! Let’s make our voices heard! 

— Written by Jesaiah Wescombe & Kari Imer

[ Our Cause Dedicated Email @stopsnapchatmemorytax@gmail.com

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