Have any of you, the kids of the digital generation, wondered what lies in the newfound glory of Instagram? When the all-encompassing web industry infiltrated the modern world, forward-thinking boys and girls received an unprecedented medium for expressing themselves. And, as a society today witnesses a great shift in people’s lifestyle as a result of popular digital technologies, people are developing brand-new habits and preferences in entertaining themselves. From geeky college kids who fix their studying issues, to avid social activists using social media to raise disputes over hot issues – everyone seems to be immersed in the expanding virtual dimension.
Instagram, nearly the most likable tool in the array of apps today, serves as a groundbreaking implement for people to communicate in the world. It provides users with opportunities to let others see what a beautiful and exciting life they have! With this tool, people can find many useful materials such as advice on books for college, or documentary films to watch. Instagram users more and more pay attention not only to photos but on the description next to them.
It is evident that the role of content highly increases today and if you want to read more about it, look at the sample of essay about Instagram. However, given its immoderately high and, as some say, unhealthy engagement, this social media network is becoming more and more controversial these days. That being said, we decided to peek thoroughly into the controversial side of Instagram and find out how it both benefits and affects us.
Instagram Stories
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Pros
- You can present your life the way you want others to see it.
Released in 2016, the Instagram story feature right away conquered the hearts of users. Allowing them to showcase the highlights of their daily routine in the way they want, Instagram stories became a beloved tool for those who want to share their best experiences with other passionate “storytellers.” To make stories as visible as possible you need to include hashtags, and you can find out more about the ones that are popular at Gramvi.
Today the Instagram story is a particular art form, which helps users to implement their creative ideas.
- Share in the form of both videos and photos.
Your post to the network, updating your subscribers on how amazingly you spent last night, or how thrilling your bungee-jumping was, can be provided as a captivating video or a picturesque photograph. This attractive option is very convenient in terms of what you want to post in your story – last night’s exquisite food is better admired in a pic, while a bungee-jumping challenge should definitely be captured in a short astounding video!
- Extra content will not clog your main feed.
The duration of the story is only 24 hours, which means your account will not be overwhelmed with extra content. Post your photos or videos in stories and keep your feed only with necessary posts, that you want to be visible permanently.
Cons
- Stories can be kept only for 24 hours.
The last point from pros can be also included in the cons section. Yes, the duration of every Instagram story is confined to only 24 hours. And this is a pretty lousy feature, since it prevents users from being able to keep their stories as long as their pictures.
A story you post can be copied by any of your subscribers and then used for any purpose they intend. Since you can’t know which subscribers are likely to play such tricks on your stories, it’s difficult to protect your feed from malicious actions.
- Annoying messages from advertising pages.
If you want to keep your profile open for potential followers, it is hard to save your stories from the unbridled marketers. For example, when you posted the question to your story, there are many strangers who can write you prepared phrases not relevant to your question.
Instagram Live
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Pros
- You can capture anything in real-time.
This wonderful feature enables you to broadcast videos to your subscribers live, waiting for their curious and heartfelt comments! In order to save a video, you can make a replay and upload it to Instagram stories.
- It increases your interaction with followers.
By using Instagram Live, you can attract more followers and thus increase the engagement of your page. As you stream video, your subscribers will leave their comments for you to respond during the streaming process.
Cons
- It can suffer from some technical errors.
When watching your video, users may face certain technical issues like a bad Internet connection or problems with their mobile software. As a result, they simply stop engaging with your video.
- It drains your battery.
Live broadcasting greatly exhausts your battery, putting you at risk of shutting down your streaming halfway through the process.
IGTV
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Pros
- It has a remarkable duration feature.
This standalone application by Instagram gives users much broader opportunities in making videos. IGTV extends the duration of videos to one hour, enabling you to include more cool stuff in your product than you could with classic Instagram videos.
- It’s easy to use.
The IGTV app displays a rather neat and well-developed interface that makes the user experience enjoyable and seamless. When the video you want to post on the main feed is too long, the app will automatically save the rest of the content to the IGTV section. Here people can share their experience without big limits in time and broad knowledge of those who really need it.
Cons
- It is supported only by smartphone platforms.
To date, there hasn’t been offered a website where users can access this app. It remains to be only app-accessible, which means that you can watch its video only within a smartphone’s screen, which is quite small compared to a laptop.
- It suffers from a lack of content.
Given that this video application is relatively new in the digital market, it is poor in video content. Users are only given videos from YouTube and the channels of the few IGTV bloggers, which is quite a limited selection. A small amount of audience from any account will continue watching the best part of the video over a minute you just posted to your main feed. It can strongly decrease the number of followers on your account because of the inconvenience tracking of content you post.
