Snapchat continues to make strides in its social capabilities; after starting out simply and then adding text/video chat, they then followed that with photo and video stories.

These “stories” were significant to Snapchat’s development, allowing more than just one-on-one interaction between users, group participation for major events, and even letting Snapchat send out messages itself.

The next step is keeping your attention for an even longer period by way of in-house content, which is a departure from how most other popular social networks do things.  Snapchat is planning to launch a new feature called “Discover,” and has hired journalists and video producers to that end recently.

The service will be ad-supported, and will also publish content from outside news sources like CNN or ESPN.  It’s not clear exactly how Discover will function, but will reportedly feature videos up to a few minutes long, as well as photos and text.  The current deals between Snapchat and outside publishers are six months long, and are open to renegotiation or substitution after that.

For more information, please visit The Verge.