EghtesadOnline: Instagram’s copying was already a serious threat to Snap Inc. Now Facebook Inc.’s photo-sharing application is adding another signature Snap chat feature: the ability for people to digitally add animal ears and flower crowns to their selfies.

EghtesadOnline: Snap Inc stock rose on Monday after the Snap chat owner received its first "buy" rating from a Wall Street analyst following a $3.4 billion public listing this month that raised the eyebrows of many on Wall Street.

EghtesadOnline: Facebook Inc., Twitter Inc. and Snap Inc. are seeking online rights to video highlights from next year’s World Cup, soccer’s most popular tournament, according to two people familiar with the matter.

EghtesadOnline: On Cinco de Mayo, millions of Snap chat users willingly turned their selfies into an ad for Taco Bell. The app’s augmented-reality camera filter, known on the service as a Lens, let them see their heads in the shape of a giant, wobbling hardshell taco, with lettuce and tomato poking out and the fast-food chain’s logo in the corner of the shot. In the one day it was available, the filter racked up about 224 million views.

EghtesadOnline: Snap Inc., the maker of mobile messaging service Snap chat, unveiled a way for users to submit video and photos to stories that can be searched and seen by a wider audience.

EghtesadOnline: Dirty jokes and NSFW GIFs. Snap s of unsuspecting colleagues on the trading floor. Screenshots of confidential client positions. All that -- and, on occasion, even legally dubious information -- is increasingly being trafficked over the new private lines of Wall Street: encrypted messaging services like WhatsApp and Signal.

EghtesadOnline: Facebook Inc. is making a dramatic change to the social network's mobile application, letting people post pictures and videos that disappear after 24 hours.

EghtesadOnline: With the release of a new video app called Clips, Apple Inc is inching one step closer to fully engaging in the messaging world, where its huge base of iPhone users could help it compete with Snap Inc's Snap chat and Facebook Inc's Messenger.

EghtesadOnline: Snap Inc., maker of the disappearing photo app dependent upon the fickle favor of the millennial demographic, is going public at a valuation at least twice as expensive as Facebook Inc., and four times more costly than Twitter Inc.

EghtesadOnline: Sony Entertainment Chief Executive Michael Lynton will step down to become chairman of the board of messaging app owner Snap Inc, a move that puts an experienced Hollywood executive in a prominent role as the technology company prepares for an initial public offering.

EghtesadOnline: Instagram will start to introduce advertising to its stories feature as it becomes more popular, stepping up competition with Snap Inc.

EghtesadOnline: Social media firm Snap Inc may be the highest profile tech IPO planned for 2017, with the potential to raise billions.