A selection of the 36 artists, athletes, and actors profiled on the new Snapshot
Apple has released a new website called Snapshot, which looks like it’s a guide to find out more about the stars of Apple Music, Apple TV+, and sports, although it’s initially rather limited.
Apple has occasionally tried spotlighting particular celebrities, whether that’s musicians through its failed Ping service, or the more successful Apple Music list of the Best 100 Albums. Now it has launched a more broad but a little shallow celebration of “the artists, actors, and athletes you love across Apple.”
The new Snapshot website at snapshot.apple.com presents 36 celebrities who feature in Apple Music, Apple TV+, or Apple sports coverage. They’re presented as a name and photo in a pair of lists that slowly scroll horizontally.
It’s a very slow scroll, though, with no option to swipe forward through it. You can make it even slower by clicking a pause button, but the scrolling is so slow that you could accidentally do that and take moments to realise.
But then what you are meant to do is click or tap on the name or photo, and you’re then taken to a page about that person. The page offers a brief biography of them, a link to their most recent work, and then how to find out more about them through Apple Music or Apple TV+.
Example celebrity profile page from the new Snapshot service
If you go into a specific person and then tap to come back, you’re returned to the start of the list. So if you make a mistake and tap the wrong person, you can be stuck waiting for the right name to come back again.
The list doesn’t appear to be in any specific order, too. It’s certainly not alphabetical, but it’s also not grouped to put, say actors next to each other. So musician Bad Bunny is right next to actor/producer Rashida Jones, who is followed by Lady Gaga.
Similarly, there’s no clear reason why there are two lines of 18 celebrities each, instead of one of all 36. It’s also a curious list in that despite appearing to be specifically about individuals, the groups “Coldplay” and BTS are included.
The way each person, or group, is presented is a little reminiscent of how the Apple TV app shows apps on an Apple TV 4K.
Otherwise, this feels like a new step for Apple, just one where it’s not immediately clear how it will successfully promote any of the people it highlights. Even if Apple comes to link to it from its various services, it’s still going to be the case that it’s quicker and maybe more natural to look for celebrities directly on Apple Music or Apple TV+.
