CHLOE SFERRA
News Editor
Social media continues to grow around the world as people become more interested in how other people behave. The easiest way to share this information seems to be through Snapchat, and Denison is no different.
DENISONsnaps is an account ran by a student here on campus through the Snapchat app. Many students submit their photos and videos to be posted on this account. Many students follow this account, yet the owner stays anonymous, with only a few friends knowing the identity.
“I am the one and only owner and creator of DENISONsnaps. And no, this was not created by Charlie Vinopal,” the owner said. “I created the account about a year and a half ago. I originally heard of other schools having a submission based Snapchat Stories. I thought that it would be a cool idea to bring to Denison’s campus. I also thought that I could personally put my own unique twist on it.”
DENISONsnaps tries to reach out to the students and bring the community together. Last September, the owner used a different social media account named Yik Yak to tell people about the account. Since then, submissions have rolled in every week.
However, not everyone in Denison’s community supports the account. While people in Denison’s administration were unavailable to comment, the account has been flagged several times by administration which causes the account to go silent for a period of time.
“I personally think that the Denison University Administration is very conscious of the image that they want to create. Administration is also very diligent in certain aspects in how they manage students. At the end of the day, DENISONsnaps is not for the public or for Administration,” said the owner.
The owner has even gone through the process of blocking several administrators from the account because he does not believe students would want their snaps to be viewed by faculty. He wants the account to be for the students only.
“We love you Dillard, but unless you’re going to submit some snaps to DENISONsnaps, I think it’s better if you stay off of it,” he said.
On the weekdays, the owner can receive anywhere from 10-25 snaps a day and as many as 75 snaps on the weekends. This means the owner must decide what content to post and the variety of content that is represented. Snapchat allows content to be posted for 24 hours before it is deleted. In that time, each story gets between 1.4K – 1.8K views.
Viewers include current students and graduated seniors from last year who still follow the account. The owner used to post everyday but found the time commitment to be too much, which pushes him to focus on quality over quantity.
“I think the idea of this account is really cool because we wouldn’t have a way to share these photos and videos without DenisonSNAPS,” said Chris Fisher ‘20, a biology major from San Francisco.
On the day of the owner’s graduation, he plans to reveal his face with the caption “Sup guys, I am DENISONsnaps” before handing the account down to someone he deems worthy of the account.
“I believe that at Denison, there are all sorts of people that go here and participate in all sorts of things”. He noted that “a lot of the submissions I get are humor based or people napping in public places. But I see no reason that big sports games, theatre productions or our favorite Spoon University videos can’t be submitted and posted. DENISONsnaps is for the Denison community therefore, I want Denison community clubs, teams, and programs to be able to use it as a tool to reach others,” said the owner.
Many students agree that this is a good way to connect the school. “Although this is a small school I still don’t feel like I know everyone, so it is really nice to see what everyone is doing on campus,” Katie Aucamp ‘20, a communication major from Florida.
“The beauty of DENISONsnaps is that anyone can submit something. I choose to post snaps that show a variety of things that go on around campus,” said the owner. “This could be people partying on Friday night, to people having fun at the Gamers Guild, to students studying abroad showing off their experiences. I want to create a mini network that all Denison kids can enjoy and be a part of.”