The reason snaps disappear is to enable one of the key effects of Snapchat which is low-stakes social interaction. Users feel they can be more relaxed in their interactions when they cannot be recalled later. To quote the article:<p><pre><code>    There’s no public view count, follower count, likes count, or any other social
    dick-measuring contest. You can just put whatever you’re doing on Snapchat; if
    people don’t like it, who gives a fuck, you’ll never know. There’s no
    expectation of balling out 24&#x2F;7.
    
    Consequently, on Snapchat I’ll post to my daily Story almost twice as much as
    I’ll post to Twitter and Facebook combined to reach only a fraction of the
    number of people. The cost of content creation is extremely low, and Snapchat
    makes it fun to think about what aspects of what I’m doing every day might be
    cool for other people to see.

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Many people do feel social pressure to be &quot;cool&quot;, to perform to the perceived expectations of the groups they belong too. Given that, many people clamor for &quot;lower stakes&quot; interactions. While the same &quot;lowering of the stakes&quot; could happen at a social level, and I believe that is something that&#x27;s happening slowly over the long term, a much faster route is to use a tool that enforces lower stakes, such as Snapchat.<p>If you are someone who does not find the appeal in low-stakes interactions, then it&#x27;s quite understandable that Snapchat may not appeal to you.