Apple tends to find ways to kill popular apps, but this time someone else did the work for them. Nikita Bier, an app maker with Midas Touch, announced its new product on Wednesday—an app called Explode which brings disappearing messages and texts directly to iMessage. Have someone log on to Snapchat and see how they feel.
Explode is pretty simple: it gives anyone with the app the ability to send texts and photos that have a limited viewing window. Once they’re gone, they’re gone forever. It also doesn’t require both parties to have the app installed to use it—only the sender needs to have the app installed and can choose how long the text or image is available.
Ladies and Gentlemen, I am pleased to announce my newest app:
Introducing Explode
· Send disappearing texts and photos within iMessage
· Only the sender needs the app: insert them directly into your conversations
· Screenshots are also blockedWhy did we build it? Explode is an app for spite. Yes, one… pic.twitter.com/mGwmoN28T8
— Nikita Bier (@nikitabier) January 14, 2025
Although the app is free to download, there are paid, premium features. For $39.99 per year or $7.99 per month, users can subscribe to Explode+ to receive screenshot alerts, block screenshots from being taken, view messages they’ve previously sent, and lock the photo preview after sending to keep available.
If it sounds a lot like Snapchat and its premium option, Snapchat+, that’s very much on purpose. Bier described Explode as a “pity app,” a response to a bad experience he had with Snapchat.
“Two years ago I met with the CEO of Snapchat to discuss the acquisition of my previous company. I’ve been open about how fast we’re growing. Just one week later – over the Thanksgiving holiday – Snapchat pulled our app from the SnapKit platform, bringing our growth to a screeching halt,” Bier wrote on Twitter. “As Ghengis Khan once said: the greatest pleasure is to defeat your enemies, rob them of their wealth and see them bathed in tears.”
Bier has a lot of experience working with big players in technology. After that, he sold his first viral hit, an anonymous voting app called tbh, to Facebook gathers more than two million users per day. His second big foray into an app, an anonymous complimenting app called Gas, was sold to Discord after it surpassed seven million downloads—and based on the timeline Bier gives of his Snapchat beef, it’s likely the app he’s been talking to the company about.
So, will Explode be able to influence Snapchat’s user base? There’s a pretty decent reason to be skeptical. The ephemeral nature of disappearing texts and images is undoubtedly Snapchat’s selling point, and the gamification of those communications also keeps people (mostly teenagers) coming back. Snapchat Streaks—a record of how many days two people have been messaging back and forth—are real social capital among teenagerslike Snapchat trophies, friendship badges are awarded based on how often users interact with each other.
The secret to Snapchat isn’t the disappearing messages—which have been successfully replicated by almost every app at this point, including Facebook Messenger, Instagram, and Telegram. It’s an addictive board game, which it certainly is it is not good for the general welfare people obsessed with friendship metrics, but it’s probably good for Snapchat’s longevity.