In a move to annoy customers (or just me), Instagram is following in the steps of Facebook and Twitter and will start sorting its photo feed so users will see “moments they care about first.” NO! IS YOUR MARKETING DEPARTMENT INEPT?
Sorry. I was annoyed when Facebook did it, I was even more annoyed when Twitter did it, and now I’m moving to 500px now that Instagram is doing it. C’mon, at least give users the option to turn this feature on or off. Even Facebook lets you access the albeit-hidden Recent News Feed. This feature doesn’t even make sense with Twitter, though. Twitter is prized for its ability for breaking news, and if they start sorting tweets based on the “most popular” or whatever, they’re shooting an arrow right into poor Achilles’ heel.
“You may be surprised to learn that people miss on average 70 percent of their feeds. As Instagram has grown, it’s become harder to keep up with all the photos and videos people share. This means you often don’t see the posts you might care about the most. To improve your experience, your feed will soon be ordered to show the moments we believe you will care about the most.
The order of photos and videos in your feed will be based on the likelihood you’ll be interested in the content, your relationship with the person posting and the timeliness of the post. As we begin, we’re focusing on optimizing the order — all the posts will still be there, just in a different order.
If your favorite musician shares a video from last night’s concert, it will be waiting for you when you wake up, no matter how many accounts you follow or what time zone you live in. And when your best friend posts a photo of her new puppy, you won’t miss it. We’re going to take time to get this right and listen to your feedback along the way. You’ll see this new experience in the coming months.”
Here’s some feedback Instagram: [insert middle finger].
