The "send random messages/sounds to your friends app" Swapnote for the Nintendo 3DS will no longer be functional via Spotpass (online). Nintendo decided that since some young children are sending inappropriate content to another, that the only option they have is to shut down the service. It will still be functional via Streetpass, but don't expect messages from your friends who aren't next to you already or any special messages from Nintendo.

...Really? May as well get rid of the web browser and YouTube apps since those have even more access to vulgarity. Granted I never really used it that much, but it was fun to scribble random stuff and send it to my friends.

Source

It was fun whilst it lasted for me. I don't use it anymore, but I think the reasoning behind shutting it down is ridiculous.

Welp, I never used it and only one person I ever streetpassed used it. One out of three hundred something? Not good odds.

Meh I never used it.

I sometimes use, but someone on my friends list always sent me stuff all the time. I wounder if he knows he cant send suff over to me anymore through online.

Well, this stinks. One of my cousins sometimes sent stuff to me and my siblings, whether just to say hi or to show off a picture in New Leaf or some other game. I guess we'll have to let him know he can't do that anymore.

It does make sense, though. Nintendo didn't want to get in trouble for being the postmaster for the transmission of illegal images (likely pornography--which is illegal for children to access because of CIPA--by the wording of it). And don't say it never happens, because I remember one specific VR user who harassed another VR user with inappropriate images over the service.

The stupidity of some people never ceases to amaze me.

Well, if anything...

Hundreds of megabytes, freed, on my SD card, seeing as I barely use it.

Though...

I'm not supposed to delete it, anyway. Memories can never be restored.

Maybe if they return the service, they'll have some sort block patch or something? To block stuff before being seen. (kinda like a scan thing like pokebank will have)

I honestly deleted it after I heard about this news. I don't really know anyone who really uses StreetPass for Swapnote, and since I lost all my downloaded stationary from SpotPass notes from Nintendo in a system transfer, I see no reason to have it.

TL;DR, nothing of value was lost to me.

So we still haven't been given a proper Pictochat replacement, but they decide to cripple the only half-decent thing.

Yay for getting my SD card space back.

I rarely even used it. I don't mind the extra free space on my SD card now.

I wonder if they can make a normal message service to message friends on your friends list. Something you can access in the middle of a game.
I don't know how hard that'd be to develop, but that's what I was hoping for originally with the 3DS.

I can't say I know anyone who used this regularly anyway. The last time I checked Swapnote (October), the most recent activity it found was from June. I had about twenty people on my friend roster at the time. And in the ~800 StreetPass I've collected since I started actively using it in September, not one of them had Swapnote as their most recent software.

Idk why Nintendo said "people are using it to be inappropriate" and not "it's just dead weight on our servers," which is probably more true.

I didn't use it anyway but, I thought that it was MY fault because the note seemed directly pointed at me. I thought I just ruined swapnote. .o.

Sadly, there looks like a serious reason for the closure of SwapNote.