Articles about Instagram

The groundswell of interest in the fediverse really kicked off when Elon Musk took over at Twitter, renamed it X, and made a seemingly endless series of controversial changes and decisions. A large number of users sought new homes, and the likes of Bluesky and Mastodon reaped the benefits.

Another recent entrant into the social arena is Threads -- Meta's answer to X. For quite some time there has been talk about plans to plug Threads into the fediverse, much to the disgust of many Mastodon users. Now this day has rolled around, with Mark Zuckerberg announcing that fediverse integration is now available to some users in beta.

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Meta has announced a series of updates to Instagram, all of which are likely to be welcomed by users. Perhaps the most significant change is the option to edit the DMs you've sent, but there are other notable new features -- including disabling read receipts.

The latest round of Instagram updates also sees the introduction of a message pinning option that makes it easier to access keys one-on-one or group chats. On top of all this, reply options have been upgraded, new themes have been added, and more.

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The rivalry between tech billionaires Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg is hard to miss. There was, for a while, talk of the two men having a cage fight -- although that predictably came to nothing -- and  Zuckerberg's Meta recently introduced its "Twitter killer" app, Threads, after perceiving weakness in Musk's own social media platform (now called X).

While Threads hasn't been quite the huge hit that Meta was hoping for (just yet at least), it has clearly had some impact on X. You should never bet against Elon Musk though. If you've ever wondered what Meta's Instagram might look like if Musk took over that as part of X's expansion of the "everything app", we have the answer.

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Although it only launched a couple of days ago, Meta's new Twitter rival Threads is already a big success. It's lacking some important features at the moment, although they are coming, and not all of its capabilities are obvious.

For example, it's not clear how to add a second account to Threads, or how to switch between accounts, but it is possible.

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For many people the release of Threads, Instagram's text-based conversation app, represents an alternative to Twitter -- a platform which is widely considered to have become more toxic and problematic under Elon Musk. But for an even larger number of people, Threads will be their first step into this type of social media.

Switching from Twitter, Mastodon or Bluesky to Threads -- or using them in conjunction with each other -- is painless, but for anyone who has never used such a platform, the language surrounding it can be slightly mystifying. And this is why Meta has released a Threads Dictionary to bring users up to speed.

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Threads, Meta's Twitter alternative, is now live and already proving incredibly popular. It's very much a work in progress, with lots of features missing, but the developers are working hard at bringing these to the app.

One question I've seen asked quite a few times is how to add a second account to Threads, and it's definitely not as obvious as it could be. The process is easy enough though, just follow these steps.

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Not to be outdone by Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg has taken to Instagram to announce the rollout of a paid-for Meta Verified program. While it is already possible to receive a Twitter-style blue tick of verification on Facebook and Instagram, the new subscription service will give users the opportunity to pay for the badge.

Echoing the claims of Musk, Zuckerberg says that "this new feature is about increasing authenticity and security across our services". With a charge of between $12 and $15 per month, there is obviously a financial benefit for Meta as well.

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It is quite some time since Facebook was hit with the "free the nipple" campaign that demanded the company stop censoring or removing images of breastfeeding women. But now Meta is facing new recommendations from its independent Oversight Board to update the Adult Nudity and Sexual Activity Community Standard that it applies to Facebook and Instagram content to ensure it is "governed by clear criteria that respect international human rights standards".

The recommendation comes as the Oversight Board overturned Meta's decisions in 2021 and 2022 to remove content posted by a couple -- one of whom is transgender, the other non-binary -- for violating Sexual Solicitation Community Standards. Meta is criticized for taking a simplistic view of gender, with the Board saying that it is "unclear how the rules apply to intersex, non-binary and transgender people, and requires reviewers to make rapid and subjective assessments of sex and gender, which is not practical when moderating content at scale".

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For anyone invested in social media, copyright infringement is a big deal. Users must be able to protect their intellectual property from imposters and opportunists trying to ride their coattails. As such, most platforms invite content owners to report infringement, but this useful function has joined the long list of communication channels cybercriminals exploit.

Trustwave researchers have found criminal gangs are impersonating Instagram’s copyright report emails in phishing campaigns, angling to trick users into sharing their details.

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Following a backlash from ordinary users, as well as influencers and celebrities such as Kim Kardashian and Kylie Jenner, Instagram has announced that it is rolling back a number of recent changes to the social platform.

One of the new features that caused widespread irritation was a TikTok-aping video-focused recommendation system which means users were no longer seeing as much content from accounts they actually follow. Another unpopular change was a new full-screen view for posts. Instagram owners Meta says that after the rollback it will "take the time" to get the changes right.

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Like most social media platforms, Instagram has a minimum age for users -- in this instance, it is 13 years old. But verifying ages online -- particularly for non-adults -- has long proved difficult. Now Instagram thinks it has come up with a solution.

As part of measure to enforce age limits more strongly, Instagram is preparing to use a variety of techniques to confirm that younger users are the age they claim to be. One of the options that will be available to such users is uploading a video selfie which will be shared with age-checking agencies.

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For people with less sense than money, there are NFTs to waste hard-earned cash on. But Meta is introducing a new way to part fools from their money -- Avatars Store.

These will be available for Facebook, Instagram and Messenger, and will give users the opportunity to buy digital clothes with which to adorn their avatar. Attempting to justify the selling of more digital fluff, Mark Zuckerberg insists that "digital goods will be an important way to express yourself in the metaverse and a big driver of the creative economy".

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Meta has announced a temporary change in its hate speech policies, meaning that users in some countries will be allowed to post content that would otherwise have been banned. The change means that users of Facebook and Instagram will be able to promote violence against Russian soldiers, as well as call for the death of President Putin, without fear of censorship.

Posts that include violent speech such as "death to the Russian invaders" are to be permitted in numerous countries, but there is the matter of the context of the invasion of Ukraine to keep in mind. At the same time, the privacy-focused search engine DuckDuckGo has surprised many by announcing that it will downrate sites that publish Russian propaganda and disinformation.

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The head of Instagram, Adam Mosseri, has revealed details of tests that are currently underway that will change the way feeds are displayed on the platform. Among the options that are on the way is the much-requested ability to see a chronological feed.

In all, there are three feed viewing options that are undergoing testing -- something Mosseri describes as giving "you more control over your Instagram experience". Of the three views, two of them allow for chronological scrolling through posts.

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Instagram has been busy adding new options and features recently, with no fewer than three rolling out this week. Head of the visual social network, Adam Mosseri, shares details about Instagram Playback, Reels Visual Replies, and Profile Embed.

Instagram Playback is a perfect end-of-year feature, giving users the ability to share their favorite Stories from the year in a new post. The company has also made it possible to reply to commends with Reels, and -- assuming you live in the right part of the world -- to embed a miniature version of your Instagram profile in websites.

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