Local Stories is a feature that has been around on Snapchat for quite some time now. Simply put, the feature quickly lets you see what’s happening around your city by pulling in videos publicly posted by users in that area. If a new report is to be believed, it appears that Snapchat doesn’t seem to be willing to keep this feature around any longer for cities.
Bloomberg hears from unnamed sources that Snapchat is going to drop Local Stories for cities so that it can focus more on special events and “live moments” like the holidays or a major sporting match.
Apparently, the reason for this decision is the simple fact that Local Stories for cities just did not prove to be as popular as Snapchat might have hoped, so now it sees no value in keeping it around.
Snapchat confirmed in a statement to the scribe that “A small number of Local Story curator positions were eliminated in our Los Angeles and New York offices, as the result of changes to our Local Story Coverage.”
The ephemeral messaging service is now more focused on securing deals for video series and other content that can provide more value for users even if that comes at the cost of losing some of Snapchat’s local flavor.