On Media Blog Archives Select Date… December, 2015 November, 2015 October, 2015 September, 2015 August, 2015 July, 2015 June, 2015 May, 2015 April, 2015 March, 2015 February, 2015 January, 2015

Snapchat hiring ahead of 2016

Nearly one month after hiring political reporter Peter Hamby from CNN, the social media application Snapchat is looking to hire "content analysts" to help them cover the 2016 presidential election and other major news events.

"We're looking for political junkies and news aficionados to join our team in NYC to help review Snaps that are submitted to Our Story events, and cover the 2016 presidential race and other news events for Snapchat," a new job posting reads.

The posting provides a clearer picture of what Snapchat, a video messaging application, is hoping to achieve in the news space. "Our Story" is a feature that allows users to share their video footage to a shared file, providing Snapchat with content it can then curate into a documentary-style package.

The 2016 content analysts will "use submitted Snaps ... to tell stories about the 2016 presidential race," the posting says, as well as posting their own campaign-related footage.

In the most general terms, Snapchat is looking to capitalize on the immense amount of real-time video content that is being provided by the application's users (for free). When well curated, this footage can be used to offer new perspectives on news stories and events, such as a music festival, a police riot or, say, a major political convention.

Hamby, a longtime CNN political correspondent, has been tasked with shaping this effort.

"Snapchat is one of the most exciting young companies in the world," he told the On Media blog in late April. "They have a big and growing audience, and we've seen Discover is a huge success. Their live stories around big events, around places both here and abroad, the potential to take users to new places — we can see some application of that with news."