With the recent abundance of pointless phone applications and ridiculous games that keep smartphone users busy throughout the day comes a new application that has become popular in only a matter of months. The new app Snapchat hit the Apple app store in September 2011 and the Android Google Play two months later.

The concept of Snapchat is easy. Simply take a picture with the phone when you open the free application. After the picture is taken, the user can add captions and drawings on top of the image. After the picture is done being edited, the user can send it to anyone else who has the Snapchat application on their phone.

There’s more though. Once the recipient gets the picture on Snapchat, they can only see the image for up to 10 seconds and then it is gone forever. If you try to take a screenshot with your phone, it‘s deleted automatically from the device. The person who sends the picture gets to choose how many seconds the picture exists, so the recipient may only see the image for a few seconds.

Since the release of the Snapchat app, the community of Snapchat users have shared over one billion pictures with the application. Worldwide, 20 million Snapchats are sent each day alone and easier than just sending people pictures.

To get Snapchat for yourself, visit the App store for iPhones and iPods and the Android Google Play Store for all android phones.