Step aside, Instagram; a new photo-sharing mobile app has hit app store shelves. Snapchat is a recently popularized app that allows users to take a photo from their phone, add text or draw on the photo, and send it to other friends who use the app. What makes this any different from sending photos by regular old SMS is the fact that Snapchat allows people to set timers on the photos they send. After the set time is up, the photo vanishes and the recipient can no longer see it.

When I first heard of Snapchat, I didn’t find anything that cool about it; my friend urged me to download it, so I did, but I wondered why I couldn’t just use picture messaging. Soon after I started using the app, however, my question was answered.

Snapchat is much more valuable than boring old picture messaging. Not only does it send photos much faster than via SMS, it seems to take them much faster as well. If you want to share something with a friend super fast, Snapchat’s your best friend.

The downside to Snapchat, however, is the fact that because of the timer feature, people now think it’s OK to make really embarrassing faces in public in the name of sending a funny picture to their friend that will disappear forever (but user beware: the iPhone’s screenshot option does make it possible for the receiver of the photo to save it to their camera roll if they’re fast enough).