In Silicon Valley, companies prefer to highlight the innovation that occurs in their open offices, shared workspaces and halls, and downplay everything else. But much of today’s most popular technology is also the product of a fair amount of cribbing from the competition.
Just last week, Skype announced Highlights, the latest in a string of features rolled out over the last 8 months from services such as Facebook (FB) (and Facebook-owned companies, Instagram and WhatsApp) that closely mimic Snapchat’s popular Stories feature. Instagram, in particular, has been surprisingly upfront about its design inspiration. When Instagram launched Instagram Stories last August, for instance, Instagram CEO Kevin Systrom told TechCrunch that Snapchat deserved “all the credit.”
Some were quick to point out Facebook’s cribbing of Snapchat Stories, in part because of the remarkable rapid-fire execution earlier this year across properties including WhatsApp, Messenger and the Facebook app. But the news also raised eyebrows because it seemed like a Machiavellian scheme by Mark Zuckerberg to smite Snapchat, which reportedly spurned a $3 billion acquisition offer in 2013.
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