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Instagram Rolls Out Plan For In-Feed Advertisments

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the imagemagick-to-remain-ad-free dept.

New submitter cagraham writes "The currently ad-free Instagram has announced a plan to monetize its services by selling premium placement to brands. 35 year old Emily White is in charge of making Instagram profitable, according to the Wall Street Journal. The move shows the new priorities of parent-company Facebook, who now has to worry about appeasing shareholders, as well as fending off rivals such as Twitter. Whether Instagram's young and growing user base will balk at the ads, or even notice them, remains to be seen."

33 of 60 comments (clear)

  1. I think it is necessary by xevioso · · Score: 3, Interesting

    It's necessary for the internet to grow and evolve. As soon as they start putting ads on Instagram, on devices that don't have much real estate to begin with, people will start flocking to new and upcoming apps or websites that do something similar, but slightly different, and with no ads. Then eventually a lagre company will buy said app, once the user base trends huge, and they will try to figure out how to monetize the new app. This is how the internet works.

    1. Re:I think it is necessary by DogDude · · Score: 5, Insightful

      No, the Internet used to be ad-free. People used to use the Internet to learn things, and to share information with other people. Until the unwashed massed got to it in the mid 90's, the Internet was wonderful: Email, Gopher, WWW, FTP, etc.

      In fact, those bits of the Internet are still there, but they've been overwhelmed and vastly out-numbered by people more interested in money than being an intelligent, compassionate human being.

      --
      I don't respond to AC's.
    2. Re:I think it is necessary by phantomfive · · Score: 1

      Ugh, that sounds educational. No way it will catch on.

      As cynical as you sound, it's taken me a long time to come to terms with the fact that most other people don't have the same sense of joy in learning for learning's sake. The thirst for self-improvement.

      I still don't entirely understand a world like that, and am glad that not everyone is that way.

      --
      "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
    3. Re:I think it is necessary by xenobyte · · Score: 2

      So every time a web site or app starts showing ads, people stop using it? How is Google still in business? How is Slashdot still in business?

      Ad-blockers? - They make the experience tolerable and allows the visitors to focus on the subject matter, not some noisy, bouncing, obscuring- or attention-grabbing ad for something nobody really needs.

      Using good ad-blockers helps keep the Internet almost completely ad free, the way it should be.

      --
      "For every complex problem, there is a solution that is simple, neat, and wrong." -- H.L. Mencken (1880-1956) --
    4. Re:I think it is necessary by trawg · · Score: 1

      No, the Internet used to be ad-free. People used to use the Internet to learn things, and to share information with other people. Until the unwashed massed got to it in the mid 90's, the Internet was wonderful: Email, Gopher, WWW, FTP, etc.

      It used to be ad-free because the cost of running those services was trivial and handled by educational and research institutions.

      Now the number of services has multiplied (by a lot), both to cater to a wider variety of experiences and a larger number of people.

      The cost of running those services has multiplied (by a lot) - no longer just a few kilobytes of plain text, they are rich multimedia experiences including, in many cases gigabytes of high definition video.

      I too remember the good old days of the "wonderful" 90s Internet of using lynx to look at web pages and figuring out Trumpet so I could get Mosaic going to look at images. It was fun and exciting and great. But when I compare it to what is possible now - in many cases, completely for free if I'm prepared to sacrifice a tiny part of my attention and privacy (both of which I am conscious of and careful to manage) - well, I'm pretty amazed and what is on offer.

      Any time you want to put your hand up to be one of those intelligent, compassionate human beings and provide ad-free wonderful services - please let me know because I'll happily sign up to take advantage of them!

    5. Re:I think it is necessary by cayenne8 · · Score: 2

      I tend to disagree on this one. I was there back in the day: the WWW was a lonely place filled with homepages that did not convey any useful information, Gopher was a commercial project (hence the reason why it failed), and the communities on Usenet were just as rude as most web fora nowadays.

      Protocols were insecure and didn't scale well (local BBS'es and freenets were constantly occupied, Usenet lacked structure and moderation to facilitate large community discussions, etc.)

      The internet has changed, and largely for the better. I don't miss the days when the Internet was an obscure little research network.

      However, in the days before the internet was so commercialized, the govt largely stayed out of it and out of the way. We now have the govt passing laws trying to keep up the old ways and end up hindering progress, in order to protect commerce on the internet.

      I think that the vast commercialization was what opened the door to the world govts trying to interfere and control the internet.

      Also, the basic idea behind the internet, that any computer could hook onto the network and become a peer with all other computers is becoming largely lost in the great shuffle of 'progress'. I remember when my TOS for ISP was very simple (essentially don't do anything illegal), but there were no ports blocked, you could run servers (I cut my teeth a bit back in those days, trying to learn apache, postfix/sendmail,mixmaster, etc) on your home network and no one got pissed off that you were doing this.

      But now, the providers and govt. continue to squeeze these freedoms and ideals the internet early on had in abundance, and are trying to limit and redefine what you connection is or should be.

      I don't doubt that sadly, in the not far enough away future, that you will have to have some soft of govt issued ID just to connect, and likely you will have less and less control over your computer, and of course...more monitoring.

      This will be all in the name of:

      1. Think of the children

      2. Security from the terrorists

      3. The need to protect the online revenue generators.

      We see this already today. Heck, the first two alone give them the "keys to the Constitution" here in the US, which opens the flood gates to even more anti-user freedom legislation.

      --
      Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
    6. Re:I think it is necessary by jimbolauski · · Score: 2

      No, the Internet used to be ad-free.

      If you recall that was when the internet was subsidized an only available to very few. So instead of paying for the services that a few people can utilize with money the government confiscated from people it is now paid for by companies trying to sell a product and available to everyone.

      People used to use the Internet to learn things, and to share information with other people. Until the unwashed massed got to it in the mid 90's, the Internet was wonderful: Email, Gopher, WWW, FTP, etc.

      People still use the internet to learn things and share information, now they can also use it to make money. Further even before the "unclean masses" had the internet there were games and many other noneducational things happening on BBSs, I can remember going to my dad's work on the weekends and playing Bolo, a multiplayer tank strategy game, in the late 80's.

      In fact, those bits of the Internet are still there, but they've been overwhelmed and vastly out-numbered by people more interested in money than being an intelligent, compassionate human being.

      You must not be looking in the right spots there are vast collections of knowledge still out there, the amount of crap has gone up but so has the amount of knowledge available, college courses, instructional videos on how repair and make almost anything, published research papers. It's ashame you think only the elite few should be allowed on the internet thus significantly limiting the amount of people that can reach that knowledge so it can stay "pure". Having a tool where just about everyone is able to reach this vast well of knowledge is well worth the make you penis larger spam, and all the other crap out there.

      --
      Knowledge = Power
      P= W/t
      t=Money
      Money = Work/Knowledge so the less you know the more you make
    7. Re:I think it is necessary by Dogtanian · · Score: 1

      I tend to disagree on this one. I was there back in the day: the WWW was a lonely place filled with homepages that did not convey any useful information, Gopher was a commercial project (hence the reason why it failed), and the communities on Usenet were just as rude as most web fora nowadays.

      I have some very, *very* major concerns about the modern Internet and our reliance on it colliding with its increasing potential to turn into a virtual panopticon. Yet, purely considering things in terms of content, I think it's too easy to over-idealise the old days.

      I first used the Internet in late-1993, which is just about the point it was starting to cross over into mainstream consciousness, but when most of the old stuff was still in place (*). I remember how new and cool it seemed then, like "I can talk to people all over the world on this thing?!"

      But to be honest, by modern standards there really wasn't a lot there. The fact that in the early days of the web people could maintain lists of "useful links" without this looking laughably inadequate illustrates this point.

      Even just ten years ago (i.e. 2003) there was a lot less online. Sure, the net- and web- had grown a *lot* since its early 90s breakthrough and we'd already had the dotcom boom and bust. However, I was revising for my university finals at the time, and I clearly remember noting (with some surprise) that despite its apparent breadth of info, it was still hard to *find* and get *clear* "all-in-one-place" descriptions of the subjects I was looking up online. Information was still scattered, hard work to find- especially at the right level- and bitty. The books in the adjacent library were still far better resources in this respect.

      Ironically, that's also the time I first came across what is now probably my most-used site, Wikipedia. Except that back then, it wasn't remotely as massive- nor hence as useful- as it is today. I don't remember that much about it (**), but ironically that probably says enough- if it had been even half as large as today's WP it would have stuck in my head immediately as the aforementioned "killer resource" that didn't exist back then.

      (*) i.e. My first real use of it was Usenet, which back then was still a- or rather, *the*- forum for discussions, and I didn't use the web for the first time until several months later. The BBS I used was still text-based and accessed via telnet. Even the "guide to the net" I bought discussed gopher more than the web (though I never really used gopher much, and don't remember being too impressed with it).

      (**) I vaguely remember thinking "Is that right? Can *anyone* edit this thing?!", but I wouldn't have had the time to do that, and I had other things to worry about. I didn't really notice it until about two years later, when it was starting to really grow and I had too much time to spend editing it. :-/

      --
      "Slashdot - News and Chat Sites Deviant". (Click "homepage" link above for details).
    8. Re:I think it is necessary by OakDragon · · Score: 3, Funny

      Ignore is strength.

      There is something profound here, but I can't quite put my finger on it.

      --
      Dark Reflection
  2. Damm. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    Is there anything advertisers can't turn to shit?

  3. Whoops.... by Lordfly · · Score: 4, Funny

    My finger slipped. Instead of clicking on the "premium ad experience" I accidentally uninstalled Instagram from my phone.

    Damn those fat fingers.

    --
    hookers and grits.
    1. Re:Whoops.... by X0563511 · · Score: 1

      What ads? I don't know what you're talking about.

      Of course, my device is rooted - and I claim it's irresponsible for carriers to try to prevent users from doing such.

      --
      For large sets, this will be our guide even unto death, for the LORD will work for each type of data it is applied to...
  4. Why is age relevant? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Why does this summary mention Emily White’s age? What possibile relevance could that have to the story? Is there something implicit in her age that means she’ll do a better or worse job than someone of a different age?

    In the context of the article it might be slightly useful as an index to point out how generally young the company is, with a 35 year old COO. But why tell us in the summary? Why not something *informative* like “director of business operations” or “chief executive officer”? And don’t give me some anarthrous occupational nominal premodifier bullshit.

    Summary author: C–. See me after class.

    1. Re:Why is age relevant? by geminidomino · · Score: 1

      Maybe it was meant to imply that, since the average age of instagram users is in the low 2-digits, this decision, and the person making it, are out of touch with their "market?"

      Nah, damn kids are the worst at sucking down marketing drek... Even my lawn is getting popups now.

    2. Re:Why is age relevant? by MaWeiTao · · Score: 1

      I'm close to her age although we might as well be on different planets when it comes to our roles within our respective companies. I can't even comprehend how someone my age could rise to such a high executive level. The only career path I've seen like hers requires growing up in an affluent neighborhood where connections and opportunities are plentiful. It leads to an impressive resume because they got to land jobs no one else would have ever gotten on merit alone. I'm not suggesting she isn't talented, but in that world it's incidental more than a requirement. And when you're dealing with start up culture where youth is irrationally overvalued then it makes opportunities even easier to come by for these people.

      I will add that given my experience no way in hell would I ever want to work for her. Nearly every single manager under 40 I've ever had to work with is awful. They're impulsive, emotional and incredibly inefficient. They love to talk about kinship, being a part of a community, to the point that it almost sounds socialist, but then they're some of the most exploitative bastards I've ever dealt with. They'd hire only unpaid interns if they could. They expect workers to put in brutal hours and show little regard for personal time. And they tend to be vicious when they don't get what they want. And they're happy to take all the credit for the hard work of the people beneath them. These are the individuals you see everyone gush over at conferences who talk like they've done everything on their own.

      It's basically all the worst qualities of start up culture.

  5. xkcd - Instagram by tokiko · · Score: 3, Insightful

    http://xkcd.com/1150/

    1. Re:xkcd - Instagram by relyimah · · Score: 1

      Perfect! While I always hate to see ads on things, is it REALLY that hard to scroll past an ad here and there? I mean nobody is forcing you to click on it... What I hate are the ad banners on phones that are designed for you to accidentally click on them... Like they put them right next to the controls, or a menu...

    2. Re:xkcd - Instagram by CohibaVancouver · · Score: 1

      The web used to work fine before it was full of ads everywhere

      So in your model how does a site like YouTube work? Is the tremendous bandwidth and storage funded exclusively by subscriptions?

    3. Re:xkcd - Instagram by Mr.+Slippery · · Score: 2

      So in your model how does a site like YouTube work?

      Why should a site like YouTube be needed? If everyone had to host their own video content, perhaps we'd have come to useful video standards long ago? Certainly having the majority of on-line content in one place is useful for the copyright cartel, but what does it do for the rest of us?

      The other alternative would be to have ads, but not have them fill up every available space. If ads were rare and tasteful, say a single simpIe text link on each page, I wouldn't need Adblock Plus. Heck, if in addition to that they didn't track people, I might even click on one once in a while.

      Instead they're so common and obnoxious that the web is useless without ad blockers. And in 20 years of using the web (holy shit -- yes, I wrote my first HTML in 1993), I can count on my fingers the number of ads I've clicked.

      --
      Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog
      You cannot wash away blood with blood
    4. Re:xkcd - Instagram by amaurea · · Score: 1

      That's a good question. I think, in theory, that a distributed solution could handle it. You would need a distributed peer-to-peer protocol which also handles storage and discovery. The actual data transfer could be done though something like bittorrent, but with blocks downloaded chronologically.

      Services like gnutella, e-donkey etc. actually do something relatively similar to youtube when you think of it.

    5. Re:xkcd - Instagram by CohibaVancouver · · Score: 1

      what does it do for the rest of us?

      - Allows the Khan Academy to share videos which educate the world for free.

      - Allows Grandma to watch videos of her grandkids from hundreds of miles away without effort, and allows me to upload those videos without effort.

      ...to name but two. I know ads drive the Slashdot batshit bananas crazy, but f*ck, get over it. How does a 10 second ad for a Chevy ruin your life?

  6. Re:Can anything be immune from ads? by CohibaVancouver · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Why must everything be constantly monetized?

    I would love to see a social gathering site whereby people pay a small annual fee

    ...or, to put it another way, people 'monetize it.'

  7. Insta-what? by PNutts · · Score: 2

    In my day we passed along life experiences with stories and interpretive dance. Kids these days.

  8. Made me click to see if she was hot by swb · · Score: 1

    I figure anybody that far up the corporate ladder at age 35 must be at least pretty.

  9. What sort of question is that? by OhANameWhatName · · Score: 1

    Whether Instagram's young and growing user base will balk at the ads, or even notice them, remains to be seen.

    Nah, I'm sure that polluting the content won't have any impact. After all, everyone loves advertising.

  10. My first thought on reading this: ads in your pics by Streetlight · · Score: 1

    At first I expected to see advertisements installed by permanently writing them over one's pictures posted on Instagram. I'm still not sure that that's not what FB intends to do. FB's recent suggestions regarding the sale of your FB information and pics posted on FB to advertisers without compensation would be just the beginning and when they start selling your pics posted on Instagram to advertisers without compensation it may mean the end of that product. This may not be what they say now, but if the ads don't bring enough money, well, we'll see how they respond in future Terms of Service changes.

    --
    In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act. George Orwell
  11. Re:Can anything be immune from ads? by phantomfive · · Score: 1

    I would love to see a social gathering site

    Yeah, but you wouldn't pay for it. That's the problem.

    In any case, those places still exist. Try logging on to FICS, or one of the newsgroups still around.

    --
    "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
  12. Who? by Sir+Holo · · Score: 2

    What's an Instagram?

    Is that like a Polaroid, only 15 years after losing relevance?

  13. now I get it by tresstatus · · Score: 1

    instagram + in-feed + pictures of peoples food = clever?

    --
    stephen
  14. Re:Whoops by OakDragon · · Score: 1

    Looks like Slashdot is rolling out its plan for in-comment advertisements!

    --
    Dark Reflection
  15. Re:Can anything be immune from ads? by OakDragon · · Score: 1

    I wish the government would provide all the social networks for the people, free of charge!

    --
    Dark Reflection
  16. Pressgram by RyuMaou · · Score: 1

    I like the idea behind Instagram, but not the proprietary nature of it. I know I'm preaching to the choir here, but I don't like giving up my rights to work I create. I dislike, as Nicholas Carr termed it, "digital sharecropping" And, of course, now the ads have finally started on Instagram, solidifying my discomfort with it.

    But, recently, there's a new program, Pressgram, that's a free iPhone app (with an Android app coming soon, hopefully), which allows an Instagram-like experience, but uploads the photos to my WordPress blog. You can upload them to your WordPress.com blog, or, as I do, to my self-hosted WordPress blog.

    So, in my mind, it has all the "good stuff" in Instagram without the stuff I find objectionable.
    Worth checking out, if you're bent that way.

    --
    Oh, the trials and tribulations of a network geek! Read about them at: http://www.ryumaou.com/hoffman/netgeek/
  17. I fully agree, but by e70838 · · Score: 1

    keep ad block a geek secret (tongue in cheek) so that other people can continue to pay for us by watching ads.