They're coming.
Instagram officially said in a blog post that they will begin placing ads in the newsfeeds of their US users. They'll start popping up over the next few months and will be from companies that you don't already follow—because the brands you already do follow are getting free ads already. The ads will come as "high quality" photos and videos that are meant to fit the style of Instagram. If you end up hating some of the ads, like, if you got an ad for Ford when you're more of a Chevy person, you can hide it and leave feedback on the ad and describe why you didn't like it. "We’ll focus on delivering a small number of beautiful, high-quality photos and videos from a handful of brands that are already great members of the Instagram community," the company said in the post.
"As always, you own your own photos and videos. The introduction of advertising won't change this," they continued.
Of course this is a money move. The company has to look to ways to monetize, and ads have become the norm for tech companies like Twitter and Facebook. It was bound to happen, and now the days are finally here. If I had to take a guess, it will probably suck at first, seeing some random photo are video pop up from a brand you only mildly care about, but in a few weeks it won't be a thing. I mean, how many users do you follow now that post uninteresting and low-quality photos, and you still follow them? People were outraged when Facebook bought Instagram, and now Instagram has more users than it has ever had. Ads suck, but at least we don't have to pay to put crappy filters on our photos.
[viaTechCrunch]
