Snapchat working on dead-simple public vs private profile pages

Snapchat has been working on social media profiles for users that house both public and private information, according to a patent that was published in May. The company filed the patent in November 2012, but in order to get a patent approved, you typically need to submit a working model of the invention. Keep in mind that patents don't ever have to be used publicly to be granted.

Snapchat could just hold onto the software it has invented, but never implement it in the app. Still, assuming Snapchat does have plans to roll out social media profiles, here's what to expect. According to the application, Snapchat has been working on easy-to-control social media profiles that make it very obvious to users which content goes on their public profile and which content goes on a private profile only they can see.

Right now, Snapchat just has a feed of previous activity. The social media profile pages Snapchat has dreamt up are entirely controlled by users, who can drag and drop items to the top or bottom of their feeds.

On Facebook, it's tough to see which content is public and which content is private, which is where Snapchat's invention differs. "Privacy is a growing concern with social networks," the application states.

"While most social networks have configurable privacy control settings, such privacy control settings may be hard to find and in many instances they are confusing. Given that users are generally able to see all of the content that they have contributed to their profile, it can be difficult to determine what content is visible to others and what is visible to only the user."

Snapchat's solution is to make two clearly-defined sections of a profile page, one that only houses public content, and one that houses private content only the user can see. Snapchat did not return a request for comment.