Instagram is a mobile photo-sharing application and service that allows
users to share pictures and videos either publicly or privately on the service,
as well as through a variety of other social networking platforms, such as Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, and Flickr. Originally, a distinctive
feature was that it confined photos to a square shape, similar to Kodak
Instamatic and Polaroid SX-70 images, in contrast to the 4:3 aspect ratio
typically used by mobile device cameras. In August 2015, version 7.5 was
released for mobile devices, allowing users to upload media captured in any
aspect ratio, but not at full size. Users
can also apply various digital filters to their images. In June 2013,
Instagram added support for videos, allowing prerecorded square standard definition resolution clips of up to 15 seconds
to be shared; later updates introduced support for widescreen resolutions at 360p and
longer recording times for either pre-recorded (up to one minute per video, or
up to 10 minutes with a multi-video post) or disappearing live videos (up to
one hour).
Instagram was created by Kevin
Systrom and Mike Krieger, and was launched in
October 2010 as a free mobile app,
exclusively for the iOS mobile platform via the Apple App Store, but was later released for Android devices two years later, on April 3,
2012. The service rapidly gained
popularity, with over 100 million active users as of April 2012 and over 300 million as of December
2014. Support for the app is
available for iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch, Windows 10 devices and Android handsets, while third-party Instagram
apps are available for BlackBerry
10 and Nokia-Symbian Devices.
The service was acquired by Facebook in April 2012 for
approximately US$1 billion in cash and stock. In 2013, Instagram grew by 23%, while
Facebook, as the parent company, only grew by 3%.
By December 2010, Instagram had one million registered users. In June 2011, Instagram announced it
had 5 million users and it passed
10 million in September of the same year. In
April 2012, it was announced that over 30 million accounts were set up on
Instagram. In December 2014, Instagram co-founder Kevin Systrom announced that
Instagram has 300 million users accessing the site per month.
Instagram announced that 100 million photographs had been
uploaded to its service as of July 2011. This total reached 150 million in
August 2011. By May 2012, 58 photographs were being uploaded and
a new user was being gained each second. The total number of photographs
uploaded had exceeded one billion.
Users can upload photographs and short videos, follow other
users' feeds and geotag images with longitude and latitude
coordinates, or the name of a location. Every year, Instagram released Top 10
Instagram geotagged locations in the world, in pictures. Users can connect their Instagram
account to other social networking sites, enabling them to share uploaded
photos to those sites. As of June
2013, users can connect their Instagram accounts to Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr,
and Flickr.
In 2012, Instagram created web profiles which allows users to
use their Instagram account like a social media site. This gave users a web
profile featuring a selection of recently shared photographs, biographical
information, and other personal details. The web feed is a simpler version of
the phone app, mimicking the look and feel users are already accustomed to.