Meta’s done it again! They’ve launched a shiny new feature on one of their platforms with great pomp and circumstance… and their users HATE it. Instants is supposed to give Instagram users the opportunity to send unedited, “in the moment” photos to their close friends à la Snapchat, but users already have Snapchat for that, and would rather the platform deal with actual problems first.
After the great TikTok ban that wasn’t, Meta hasn’t stopped their commitment to making sure that they’re a one-stop social media shop that offers everything that can be found on other platforms. Instants is just their latest attempt to hone in on someone else’s social media turf, this time with their eye firmly fixed on Snapchat. The idea was that users could send off-the-cuff snapshots to close friends only (exactly like people do on Snapchat), and to allow users to have a more spontaneous experience while interacting on Instagram.
One major problem with that idea: Instagram is where people go specifically to share curated images that they’ve carefully crafted to fill their grid. Even with stories, people generally have a specific vibe that they go for, and they tend to stick to what works for them and what they know their audience expects. Less than 24 hours after launching Instants, the most searched-for topic in relation to Instagram wasn’t “What are Instants?” or even “How do I use Instants?” It was “How do I disable Instants?” People overwhelmingly DO NOT like the new feature, and have a laundry list of things that they’d rather the platform address first.
For instance, several users on Threads (the platform Meta built to compete with Twitter, because reminder: competing with other platforms is what they do) bemoaned being offered the opportunity to share disappearing images directly with their followers, when all they really want is for Instagram to show their content to their followers in the feed. That’s why they followed them in the first place, but with Meta running ads, users report that they’re not seeing enough from the accounts that they’re on the platform to engage with, and are instead seeing endless ads from companies whose accounts they don’t even follow.
Another major problem that Instagram users face is trying to log in, only to find that accounts they’ve been growing for years have suddenly been banned overnight for nebulous reasons. OnlyFans creators with Instagram accounts in particular have been hit hard by the latest wave of crackdowns on content that can be perceived as sexual. Instagram has a strict policy against nudity and soliciting, and even though the banned creators were (usually) following Instagram’s TOS, they still found themselves having to rebuild from scratch, or use another social media platform altogether. A common problem that banned OnlyFans creators had in common was having the link to their OnlyFans page directly in their bio. Instagram deemed a link to a site where models are asking people to pay for access to explicit videos to be a form of solicitation, and so they gave the models the boot… even though OnlyFans is fully legal and has very strict rules about consent.
Between seeing nothing but ads instead of your second cousin’s gender reveal, and users having their accounts yanked overnight with little to no warning, there’s a lot happening on the gram that could stand to be fixed rather than investing resources into forcing yet another new feature nobody asked for down our throats. Especially when that new feature is essentially attempting to replace what Instagram was initially built on so that they can give more feed space to advertisers instead of letting you see what that artist you enjoy following is up to these days.
The next time Meta decides to look over the fence to compare lawns, maybe they should remember that the grass isn’t actually always greener on the other side, but rather that it’s greener where you water it. New features are great and all — Instants excepted, because yikes. I did NOT have a good time with those either, but maybe next time Meta can focus more on fixing existing problems that users want solved, rather than spending time and money creating a flashy new feature that nobody actually wants in the first place (looking at you, Meta AI).
