Instagram - Brining Out The Photographer In Everyone

By: Louise Mougenot, Naomi Nash, Christine Maglutac, Allan Lee

Imagine having the ability to connect with friends and peers through the process of sharing photos. The ability to post, follow, share, like, and comment on pictures has provided users with a revolutionary platform of communication. The ability to communicate in this format has completely transformed the role of communication technologies, as the importance of user-generated content has become vital to the existence of such a technologies. This technology was the first of its kind, and paved for the way for other user-generated technologies in the communication sector. The uniqueness surrounding the usage of photos has drawn users in, and with the introduction of new features has kept them interested and active. What type of technology could possible provide all of this you ask? Well the answer is Instagram! Through the utilization of Van Dijck’s concepts, scholarly journals, and journalistic reporting, this blog will analyze the technology, content, users, ownership, business models and governance of Instagram. Through the analysis of Van Dijck’s framework, this blog will work to provide insight into how the social media platform known as Instagram has comprised an assemblage of connectivity.

So, what is Instagram? How does it work? What does it do? What is its purpose? Stay tuned to find out…

And now… A Message from Allan!

Filters, Videos, Emojis, Oh My!

Instagram – a social media platform that encourages average chumps like myself to become ‘professional’ photographers. When posting a photo on Instagram there are various features that allow users to alter photos in hopes to create that ‘perfect’ picture. Some of the features include but are not limited to adjusting the brightness, contrast, sharpness, highlights/shadows, color, and most importantly filters. Filters change the dynamic of a picture to portray a certain feeling. Instagram has a wide range of 40 different ones to choose from. For example, the Nashville filter creates a warm mixed feeling along with a low contrast resulting in a ‘nostalgic’ feel. Even though Instagram provides an abundant ways to edit photos – it just isn’t enough for some users. There are numerous image-editing apps specialized for editing photos available on the App Store and Google Play that have unimaginable features. For example, Retouchify has features that can apparently get rid of unwanted wrinkles or can increase a tan (try at own risk – no accuracy guaranteed, considering that it is a free app).

June 2013 - Instagram made a drastic change to their social media platform and integrated a video component. Now users could upload videos between 3-15 seconds long by either capturing it in the moment or choosing one from their photo library. Why 3-15 seconds you might ask? Instagram decided to make videos longer than vines in order to give users the opportunity to tell a full story (Duggan, 2013) – unless you’re an auctioneer there simply isn’t enough time in 6 seconds.  Videos are great especially for celebrities like Justin Bieber who are able to market new releases of upcoming albums, like Purpose or even film their personal lives, such as him skateboarding with some friends.

October 2011 – The Emoji keyboard was integrated into IPhones (Instagram Engineering Blog, 2015) and the world of social media was changed forever! With the evolution of this new ‘digital language’ emojis quickly became integrated within social media. Today nearly half of the comments and captions on Instagram contain at least one emoji character – the proof is within your newsfeed. Emojis add some fun and color to text giving and gives posts a little bit more of a realistic and relatable feel.

Users should be cautious when exploring all the new fun ways to edit their picture because over editing can make photos looks terrible (as you can see in the example below).  Don’t be that one person who posts those tacky photos and has clearly spent a lot of time editing a picture. I mean if you are putting that much time into it at least make it look naturalistic.

Instagram? Who uses that!

Instagram provides a platform that allows users to build their own unique profile on the app through the process of posting pictures. By posting pictures, users form their identity on the app, while connecting with others. As described by Jose Van Dijck (2013), technology can be thought of as a platform, which allows users to interact in their everyday lives. Dijck states, “platforms are the providers of software, (sometimes) hardware, and services that help code social activities into a computational architecture” (p. 29). It is through this platform that Instagram is able to provide users with the hardware necessary in order to post, like, comment, and share photographs through the app. As reported by Business Insider (2015) in September, the app “just hit 400 million monthly-active-users” (para. 1). In 2010, Instagram began as an app available to iPhone users. As the app grew in popularity, the platform became available to Anroid users in April of 2012, and eventually became a webpage later that year in June. By broadening the technology, Instagram is now able to reach more users than ever before. This development has allowed for software to play a part in the lives of Instagram users, as the platform has translated “encoded social activities into programmed directives to steer user behavior” (Van Dijck p. 29). This ability to steer user behavior is ultimately the reason Instagram has become so successful; keeping users interested with new features increases user-generated content, therefore ensuring that the platform is exciting both for new and existing users. The technology behind Instagram is simple, as it runs on OS/hosting, load balancing, application servers and data storage. (Instagram Engineering Blog, 2015). The technology promotes communication through simple features such as posting photos, following other users, sharing or “regramming” photos posted by other users, liking photos posted by others, and commenting on pictures. All of these features are made possible through the first step of following another user. This then translates to a feed of photos that can be scrolled through as soon as the app is opened. Instagram also provides its users with the option to set their profile to private, ensuring that only those who have requested to follow you have the ability to see your posts. Instagram’s technology also has the ability to connect to other social media technologies such as Facebook and Twitter. This therefore allows for Instagram photos to be posted on other platforms, therefore broadening the technology’s reach.

Technology!

Instagram provides a platform that allows users to build their own unique profile on the app through the process of posting pictures. By posting pictures, users form their identity on the app, while connecting with others. As described by Jose Van Dijck (2013), technology can be thought of as a platform, which allows users to interact in their everyday lives. Dijck states, “platforms are the providers of software, (sometimes) hardware, and services that help code social activities into a computational architecture” (p. 29). It is through this platform that Instagram is able to provide users with the hardware necessary in order to post, like, comment, and share photographs through the app. As reported by Business Insider (2015) in September, the app “just hit 400 million monthly-active-users” (para. 1).
In 2010, Instagram began as an app available to iPhone users. As the app grew in popularity, the platform became available to Anroid users in April of 2012, and eventually became a webpage later that year in June. By broadening the technology, Instagram is now able to reach more users than ever before. This development has allowed for software to play a part in the lives of Instagram users, as the platform has translated “encoded social activities into programmed directives to steer user behavior” (Van Dijck p. 29). This ability to steer user behavior is ultimately the reason Instagram has become so successful; keeping users interested with new features increases user-generated content, therefore ensuring that the platform is exciting both for new and existing users. The technology behind Instagram is simple, as it runs on OS/hosting, load balancing, application servers and data storage. (Instagram Engineering Blog, 2015).
The technology promotes communication through simple features such as posting photos, following other users, sharing or “regramming” photos posted by other users, liking photos posted by others, and commenting on pictures. All of these features are made possible through the first step of following another user. This then translates to a feed of photos that can be scrolled through as soon as the app is opened. Instagram also provides its users with the option to set their profile to private, ensuring that only those who have requested to follow you have the ability to see your posts. Instagram’s technology also has the ability to connect to other social media technologies such as Facebook and Twitter. This therefore allows for Instagram photos to be posted on other platforms, therefore broadening the technology’s reach.

Number Sign OR Hashtag?

An important element in the Instagram world is the use of hashtags – originally known as the number sign (#).  Hashtags allow users to be creative and are limitless to what can be hashtagged or the amount of hashtags used for one caption (however there is a 2200 character limit per post). Hashtags have more meaning than just a couple words being added to a post. On Instagram there is something known as a trending hashtag. Trending hashtags occur when that specific hashtag is used more than usual. According to the Instagram engineering blog there are three elements make it a good trend;

1)   The Popularity – attract people in the community

2)   Novelty – something new and exciting

3)   Timeliness – happens as the event is taking place

A perfect example are the northern lights. In the photo posted at the bottom, it is evident that there was a substantial spike with several users discussing, posting and hashtagging at the time of the event. Once the event was over, there was just as quick as a drop about this spectacular natural occasion.

Not only can hashtags be trending, Instagram also groups hashtags together in similar trends – in order to cater towards each and every user. There are three ways that Instagram decides to group hashtags

1)   Co-Occurrences – typically used together

                        - E.g. #fashionweek #dress #shoes

2)   Different Spellings – don’t co-occur, generally not used in same post

- E.g. #VanentineDay #Valentinesday

3)   Topic Distribution – describing the same event

         -  E.g. #HoCo2k15 #Hoco2015 #HomeComing2015

Hashtags are quite fascinating because they are able reach an audience generally interested in the same topic. The more hashtags used in a post, the more likely it will reach a greater audience and therefore more people are likely to engage. However, with that being said do not hashtag every little detail or overhashtag. Anything more than 9 hashtags is considered spam and is asking for too much attention. All in all, use them - don’t abuse them!

The Perfect Search, Just For You!

The explore and search feature on Instagram allows users to find the best suited accounts to follow. Have you ever noticed that a lot of images and videos that appear on explore somehow peak your interest? Well that’s no coincidence; Instagrams platform is based on an infrastructure known as Unicorn, which happens to be the exact same search engine that Facebook uses. Unicorn is designed to search through millions sets of data within billions of users complex operations in a matter of seconds in order to provide the best results tailored for each user. How you might ask? Unicorn is based on an information retrieval system and results are promoted with social proximity (Instagram Engineering Blog, 2015). Determining social proximity is based off of people, places, hashtags and the media. This search infrastructure relies on open source libraries and has a two-step process.

·      1) Candidate generation

o   Finding set of documents that match a given query

o   E.g. Multiple users appear when searching “name:Justin”

·      2) Ranking

o   Based on popularity

o   Computers a  ‘goodness score’

o   E.g. justinbieber has 32.3 million

The Explore section on Instagram is awesome because it displays an arrange of photos and videos based on the interest of the user. Over the years there explore section has transformed by starting with just displaying popular content on Instagram when the app was first released to now being able to rank accounts based on each user. The media displayed is prioritized by “people followed by people you follow” or by “people followed by people who follow you”. Another way that the content is chosen is based on trending places and hashtags. Instagram is always updating their software in able to cater towards the needs of their users. For example, the future of the app is looking to expand the search feature even further by adding tabs such as ‘discovery’ or ‘content’.  

If you are interested in the algorithms and technical aspects that go on behind the scenes for the Instagram app I highly recommend that you check out their blog!

→  http://instagram-engineering.tumblr.com/

History and Ownership

Instagram began its origins differently than what it has become today. Kevin Systrom, one of the co founders of Instagram, embarked originally on creating an app called Burbn that was designed to be a check in service for Foursqaure (UWIRE, 2012). Systrom had managed to raise half a million in funding and throw in his job to put this app to reality. Systrom soon met with Mike Krieger, who got on board the concept to make Burbn into a real business. The app features ability to check in, future check ins, earn points for hanging with friends and more. Soon afterwards it was realized that the app was to cluttered, and back to drawing board it was. Starting from scratch, they focused on one feature, the camera (Basu, 2012). After nearly a year of work and shipping the app, it became available on the app store in October 6 2010. It took only a few hours before it became the number one free photography app with over 1 million users by December of 2010. By September 2011, it had 10 millions users reaching its 150 millionth uploaded photo by then (Rakos, 2014). Over time, the app gained enough popularity to put resources into releasing new features into the app, from hastags, filters,video, high quality photo support and many other small details that the app enjoys today. As popularity grew, the app was released into the Android ecosystem, further expanding its user base to the popular platform. However, for the original owners, the success is short lived as soon after, the biggest social media player on the net, offered and bought out Instagram for $1 billion in cash and stock (Rakos, 2014). FaceBook's acquisition of Instagram certainly caused controversy. Not only from consumers concerned on where FaceBook will take Instagram or whether it will be an integrated feature of FaceBook, but the biggest concern was the controversy in the change in terms of service mentioned earlier. Having the ability to claim any photo uploaded to Instagram for Facebook certainly caused an uproar (SHanklin, 2012). Presently Facebook has kept Instagram as a separate entity, a smart move that has retained its current users and encouraged new ones to join its services.

Governance - What You Gotta Adhere To

Governance

Instagram provides a standard terms of service like any other media sharing website. There are of course, basic requirements and restrictions ranging from:

• ·   Must be at least 13 years of age to use
• ·   May not post violent, nude, discriminatory, unlawful, infringing, hateful, pornographic or sexually suggestive photos or other content via the service
• ·   You are Responsible for the activity of your own account
• ·   You cannot “sell” the account
• ·   Must not defame, stalk, bully, abuse, harass, threaten, impersonate or intimidate people or entities nor post private or confidential information with the service and that is just to name a few (InstagramHelpCenter, 2015).

Thus at Instagram's discretion,violation of these terms may result in termination of one's Instagram account. It’s also noted that the company is not responsible for the content posted on the service and that you use the service at your own risk.

Instagram isn’t out of the loop when it comes to the controversy of the terms of service like any other major social network.  On December of 2012, Instagram who at this point is owned by Facebook, was in the spotlight about the controversy of their new terms of use. To sum it up, Instagram can share information about its users with its parent company Facebook as well as outside advertisers. That means it will let advertisers use data and information from users who have shared on Instagram such as details of favorite places, bands, restaurants and like Facebook, target those ads to those users (Wortham, 2012).

An even more compelling note is you could star in an advertisement, without your knowledge. The new terms of service indicates that Instagram does not claim ownership of any content that you post, instead you hereby grant Instagram a non exclusive use of the content you post. Even underage users are not exempt. If a teenager signs up, it is assumed that the parent or guardian is aware that there image, username and photos can be used in ads and claim responsibility (Wortham, 2012). 

In the end, it's no surprise Instagram has some backlash during its short history. Regardless, consumers continue to use and enjoy their services despite some of the privacy and questionable terms we have to agree too. If a user wants to remove all ties with Instagram, they do have the option of deleting their account (Shanklin, 2012).

How Does Instagram Make Money?

Instagram’s business model revolves around making money through advertisements. Before Instagram was acquired by Facebook in 2012 they were not making any revenue, but in late 2013 they slowly began to monetize the company by introducing advertisements (Angelova). At a media conference hosted by Business Insider, Kevin Systrom, the CEO of Instagram, described three key factors the company needed to get right in order to become successfully monetized. First the company would need to build a large audience; when this conference took place Instagram only had 27 millions users but they have since grown to have 400 million users. Secondly the company would have to create a stage for advertisers to promote their brand and products. Today many companies use Instagram as a creative promotional tool, while maintaining a connection with their customers. Lastly Instagram would need to create tools that would allow the advertiser to use the app differently than the average user. Recently, Instagram has allowed companies to post videos that are 30 seconds long rather than the average 15 seconds. Through their present day growth it is clear that Instagram has successfully maintained the three key factors that are necessary to be successfully monetized.

With over 400 million users Instagram is one of the world’s largest advertising platforms (“Instagram Business”). When advertisements were first introduced only selected brands in the United States were able to advertise on the platform. Some of these brands included Lexus, Ben and Jerry’s, and Michael Kors. In September 2015, Instagram announced that they would be allowing any company within 30 countries to advertise on their platform. Advertisers would now be able to purchase advertising space through Facebook self-serve interfaces, such as Ads Manager and Power Editor. These programs are made to assist advertisers in creating ads for a specific platform.

On Instagram’s business webpage they specify that in order to advertise on their platform you do not require an Instagram account, you only require a Facebook account. Since Instagram uses the same advertising program as Facebook, you apply to advertise through the Facebook website. If a company without an Instagram account chooses to advertise on Instagram, the advertisement will be linked to their Facebook profile. The disadvantage of posting an Instagram advertisement with a Facebook account is that the company will be unable to respond to comments.

As Instagram has continued to grow, it is projected that they will receive $595 million in ad revenue by the end of 2015. By the end of 2017 it is projected that they will earn $2.81 billion, which is approximately 14% of the ad revenue for Facebook worldwide (“Instagram Mobile Ads Revenue”).

The projected rapid growth of Instagram’s ad revenue is due to their new advertising products. Compared to other social media platforms the price to advertise on Instagram can be quite costly. To advertise on Instagram it averages a cost-per-thousand views, or CPM, of $6.70, which is relatively high. This is due to the technology Instagram uses to target ads to specific markets. This technology is the same that Facebook uses and it posts advertisements that are specific to a user’s likes, interests, and location. Advertising on Instagram is also very valuable as users are 2.5 times more likely to click on an Instagram advertisements than on any other social media platform (Griffith).

What makes Instagram advertisements unique is the way they are integrated into the platform. The creators of Instagram wanted advertisements to look as organic as possible because they wanted them to fit seamlessly into people’s feeds. The last thing they wanted was for users to look through their feed and feel bombarded by advertisements. An important point made by Van Dijck was, “If users feel that they are being manipulated or exploited, they simply quit the site, causing the platform to lose its most important asset” (40). Before Instagram was monetized they carefully considered how they would advertise to their users as they did not want them to leave the platform. In order to prevent this, Instagram would analyze each advertisement before it was posted. This allowed Instagram to only post advertisements that they truly believed in, thus preventing spam content.

On Instagram there are three different types of advertisements: picture, video, and carousel. Picture posts are very common and until recently they always had to be perfectly square. Video posts allow companies to create short 30 second clips, which is longer than the 15 second clip the average user can post. Carousel advertisements are the newest addition to Instagram and they allow users to swipe through multiple pictures in one post. In order to identify an advertisement on Instagram, the top right corner of the post will say “Sponsored” in blue writing. Another addition to Instagram advertising is the ability to download or purchase through the Instagram app. With the release of the new iPhone, users will be able to use the app more efficiently as they will be able to use Apple Pay and Force Touch to purchase or download items.

In order to assist companies with advertising Instagram has set up a partner program. Through this program Instagram partners companies with other companies that can assist them with content creation, buying advertisements, and monitoring feedback. Through Instagram’s business model it is clear that they put a lot of thought into what they want to post on their app. It is very important to them that users do not feel like they are being exploited, but they also want their app to be used as a space for advertisers to be creative. As they continue to grow, it is clear that advertisers will continue to use their platform as a means to reach their consumer.

References

Alba, D. (2015). Instagram Now Tops 400 Million Users and 40 Billion Photos.

Wired. Retrieved from http://www.wired.com/2015/09/instagram-now-tops-400-million-users-40-billion-photos/

Angelova, K. (2012, April 12). How Instagram Planned To Make Money Before It

Was Snatched By Facebook. Retrieved November 29, 2015, from http://www.businessinsider.com/how-instagram-will-make-money-2012-4  

D’Onfro, J. (2015). Instagram hits 400 million users. Business Insider. Retrieved

from http://www.businessinsider.com/instagram-hits-400-million-users-2015-9

Basu, Kaustav. "Brief History of Instagram." Brief History of Instagram. 12 Apr.

2012. Web. 18 Dec. 2015. <http://visual.ly/brief-history-instagram>.

Duggan, M. (2013). Photo and video sharing grow online. Pew Research Internet

Project. Retrieved from http://www.pewinternet.org/files/old-media/Files/Reports/2013/PIP_Photos%20and%20videos%20online_102813.pdf

Griffith, E. (2015, September 9). Instagram gets serious about ads, opening

platform to all. Retrieved November 29, 2015, from http://fortune.com/2015/09/09/instagram-advertising/?iid=sr-link2

Hunt, E. (2015). Essena O’Neill quits Instagram claiming social media ‘is not real

life’. The Guardian. Retrieved from http://www.theguardian.com/media/2015/nov/03/instagram-star-essena-oneill-quits-2d-life-to-reveal-true-story-behind-images

"Instagram." UWIRE Text 22 Apr. 2012: 1. Academic OneFile. Web. 17 Dec. 2015.

Instagram Business. (n.d.). Retrieved November 27, 2015, from

https://business.instagram.com

Instagram Inc. (2015). Instagram Engineering. Tumbler. Retrieved from

http://instagram-engineering.tumblr.com/

"Instagram Help Center." Terms of Use. Instagram. Web. 18 Dec. 2015.

<https://help.instagram.com/478745558852511>.

Instagram Mobile Ad Revenues to Reach $2.81 Billion Worldwide in 2017. (2015,

July 27).Retrieved November 29, 2015, from http://www.emarketer.com/article.aspx?R=1012774&RewroteTitle=1

Johns, R., & English, R. (2016). Transition to self: Repositioning the celebrity

brand through social media – the case of Elizabeth Gilbert. Journal Of Business Research, 69(1), 65-72. doi:10.1016/j.jbusres.2015.07.021

Lundenberg, A. (2014). 5 Instagram Tips to Maximize Brand Presence. Public Relations

Tactics, 21(10), 8.

Rakos, Mikaela. "The History of Instagram." The DashBurst Blog. 12 May 2014.

Web. 18 Dec. 2015. <https://blog.dashburst.com/history-of-instagram/>.

Shanklin, Will. "Making Sense of the Instagram Controversy." Making Sense of

the Instagram Controversy. 13 Dec. 2012. Web. 18 Dec. 2015. <http://www.gizmag.com/instagram-copyright-controversy/25500/>.

Van Dick, J. (2013). The Culture of Connectivity: A Critical History of Social

Media. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Wortham, Jenna. "What Instagram's New Terms of Service Mean for You." Bits

What Instagrams New Terms of Service Mean for You Comments. 17 Dec. 2012. Web. 18 Dec. 2015. <http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/12/17/what-instagrams-new-terms-of-service-mean-for-you/?_r=0>.