In the beginning Instagram was an avenue where individuals shared photos with filters on them. With time Instagram has evolved to incorporate other features heavily borrowed from SnapChat. This time round they are adapting a feature that its parent company, Facebook, adapted last April. Soon you will be able to stream live videos from your Instagram account.
The following are the remarks from Instagram CEO as recorded by the Financial Times:
“Live is really exciting for us. I think it can enhance what we’re doing. If I’m trying to strengthen relationships with someone I love, them streaming video to me live would be an amazing way to be closer to them.”
-Instagram CEO Kevin Systrom
Instagram has not put a time line of when we should expect the new feature to start rolling out. By launching a video streaming feature, Instagram will be joining the likes of Periscope, which is owned by twitter, Facebook Live, a product of Facebook and YouTube in this business domain.
Systrom went ahead to emphasize that the company was focused on launching live video because of the immense success experienced from Instagram stories. His vision is to see Instagram being considered more than a service “to just take pretty photos.”
“If you’re the CEO of a company and all of a sudden 100m people are using a new format every single day, it’s not something you ignore. You push investment into it.”
– Instagram CEO Kevin Systrom
You will recall that it was only in August that Instagram introduced Instagram Stories. This feature allows users to post photos and videos with filters, text, artwork and emojis galore for just 24hrs. If you are an avid user of SnapChat then you can clearly see where Instagram’s inspiration for this feature came from. We should not forget that Instagram also followed in Facebook’s footsteps in adapting an algorithm that aims to show users posts that are most relevant to them rather than showing them in chronological order.
